


Every Defeat A Divorce

by dabblingDilettante



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arranged Marriage, Assassination Plot(s), Character Study, Detangling years of emotional manipulation and grooming: the fic: the life - Freeform, Edelgard was wrong about some things, Emotional Constipation, Gen, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Road Trips, Trauma, Tutoring, aggressively dabs out of the room
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-01-23
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:07:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 33,784
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22076674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dabblingDilettante/pseuds/dabblingDilettante
Summary: Edelgard von Hresvelg has been given away in an arranged marriage to the Almyran Court.  It would be easier to figure out why and how to survive if she didn’t have to deal with a smart-mouth translation instructor in the midst of her political intrigue.
Relationships: Edelgard von Hresvelg & Claude von Riegan, Edelgard von Hresvelg/Claude von Riegan
Comments: 47
Kudos: 273





	1. if he hasn't blown the whistle then it isn't quite the end

**Author's Note:**

> This cannot be explained beyond the fact that I love Edelgard and I love Claude. 
> 
> Canon-divergence, to be clear El is 15/16 years old here, prior to Garreg Mach. We will probably say ... three chapters is the current plan, but this portion was originally supposed to be two thousand words and not eight thousand words, and also this was originally going to be a one-shot, but as you know, the plans of mice and men. Title via Los Campesinos, "Every Defeat A Divorce." (My memories are sepia but the photograph is not / An historian is fucking with them, as deadly as garrote)
> 
> Also it did occur to me that.  
> Hey my timelines might be weird because after writing everything, i realized i had conflicting sources, so just. Its an au. Its fine. If you think it sounds weird timewise it might be. Who knows.

  
For the long journey east, Edelgard was given a comfortable carriage, filled with books and small lamps without regard for her preferred reading material. Her uncle held her hand all the way to the threshold like a threat held between their fingers. 

“Your father will worry for you, but I promised him, no harm will come to you,” he said. In his eyes, she read between the lines. As long as she does not try anything, she will be safe.

Laughter bubbled over in Edelgard’s chest, but on her face, she kept a polite smile. At 15 years old, they had discovered the perfect way to rid their court of her schemes. After years of work at Hubert’s side, they’d found the best way to ruin her plans. After more bribery than she could fathom, a distant country had finally agreed to accept a political marriage. Almyra stood on the border of the Alliance, and while they had been a sore point with the Alliance for a century, the Empire had little concern for their dealings. Perhaps that was what made it the perfect option to strand her.

Two days ago, her uncle had come to her quarters with a polite knock and a letter. He cleared his throat before he began to read aloud.

“To the Emperor Hresvelg. At the proffered alliance between our two countries, your daughter’s hand will suffice as just payment. Word has spread of your great leadership, and of the promise of your own daughter’s future excellence. Strength is valued deeply in our government. We are sure her presence will only add to our political body, with the alliance between us changing a century of war between Fodlan and Almyra. Best wishes…”

His voice trailed off in her head as she picked it apart. The great leadership of an emperor stripped of all power, a daughter picked apart by science and magic, and a council filled by corrupt men and murder. She snorted.

“My father would not agree to sell me for a political gambit,” Edelgard said.

“You aren’t wrong. However, you overestimate the value of your father’s agreement, here,” her uncle responded. “You leave in two days.”

Words fell over in her head like dominoes, all her practiced confidence falling to ash in her hands. “You can’t say you’re done with me.” It felt as though she were running after a reason, tripping, and falling into nothing. Quiet, she said, “After everything they did to give me this crest.”

“They have many plans,” her uncle said, not turning to face her. “Someone as young and foolish as you cannot begin to understand what has been planned for the last millennia. But you needn’t worry, my dear niece. You are invaluable to us. In many ways.”

At that, he left her, and Edelgard allowed herself to collapse. She ran through plans in her head. The Officer’s Academy, still two years away, had been her only potential excuse to escape Enbarr. Her father’s ever failing health had no guarantee of holding in the time it would take her to leave and return. She hadn’t even fully learned to control the Crest of Flames. For the last two years, she had bet on having just a little more time than this. Not even a decade. Just four years. Just enough to get out, away from her uncle’s sneering eyes, to somewhere she could gather allies. Allies who weren’t the people who killed every member of her family. Iron bubbled in the back of her throat and she dug nails into her arm. Old scars slithered up her skin, familiar intentions now, running like rivers into her heart. The thought made her mind freeze on the pain, only two years gone. An agony that never truly left her. Static ran into her bones.

She was not aware of how much time passed before Hubert’s hands landed on her shoulders, but the sound of his voice and his sure grip began to draw her from the fog.

“What has happened,” he whispered. She was grateful for that. The walls here had ears.

“They are exiling me,” she murmured. “They are dressing it up as a political marriage. But they are using it to get rid of me. Did they discover our plans? I do not know. …frankly, Hubert, I am no longer sure of anything. I feel I’ve wasted what little time I had.”

“No,” he said, firm. “Your majesty, I will not allow your work to go wasted. While they may distance us, I will never stop my work in your name. No matter how long it takes you to return and retake your family’s power, I will be waiting, preparing it for you. Those who slither may plan against us, but they cannot so easily end our ambitions.”

Though she nodded in response, her head still felt filled with static. “I do not even know how I will return.”

Hubert gave her a grim smile. “I have many ways. …I will not allow you to leave unprepared.”

“I have two days,” she whispered.

“More than enough time,” he said.

Hidden in the folds of her skirt were poisons. Edelgard gingerly sat, avoiding the cool glass against her legs. Hubert took care of everything he could – finding her valuables she could more easily hide in her clothing if in need of money, leaving an open space in her boots for the knife she took everywhere she went, leaving her as informed as he could.

“These poisons should not be detectable,” he told her, one late night, between walls of the castle. “There will be no smell. I recommend putting it into your betrothed’s food late at night, to allow him to be found dead come morning. No sooner. If he leaves for war, give him a half-dose. He should survive long enough for a full day of fighting, before night comes. You need to absolve yourself of blame. Allow yourself an alibi.” He glanced to another vial. “For that, I have given you an antidote. If you are poisoned too, there will be little to suspect. I leave it to you to do as you will.”

“Thank you, Hubert,” she said. “I still feel so unprepared. Almyra is not a country I have much knowledge of … if it were Brigid, I could handle the court. But Almyra, I have nothing. My books and the library offer so little. After the garrison was built at Fodlan’s Throat, nothing made it through. The best I have is what little is traded between them, but even that rarely makes it out of the Alliance. …If I am being so honest, it made me suspicious that anyone agreed. What if my uncle is using this as an excuse to have me killed in transit? I would have no way to defend myself.”

“The one thing we know is that they value strength. As any country does,” Hubert said. “I believe if you asked for an ax for your private quarters, in case they request proof of your prowess, it would be hard for him to deny if they are truly sending you off for marriage.”

In the upper carriage, her favorite ax now made its home. That was one thing. Without Hubert to guide her through panic that loved to steal her heart and courage, it would be difficult to survive. He stood outside, hand held to his chest, watching her. It made her feel almost foolish to watch him so desperately. Her one ally. The only person left on her side. Edelgard put a hand to the window as the carriage began to move. She was more a child the further they were apart, and now all she could measure was the distance between them. For how long the experimentation had gone on, for what felt like decades, Edelgard could only think of how young she was without his guiding hand to convince her to survive.

As the carriage turned, he disappeared out of sight. No longer foolish enough to chase after her as they were when they were so much younger than they were now. Edelgard withdrew her hand from the window and placed it in her lap. All she could do was steel herself in the face of change. 

“I’ll return,” she muttered. “Nothing could stop me.”

Her carriage followed another, likely filled with goods and bribery to the Almyran government for accepting the marriage offer. Each had two drivers, ready to swap out at any moment. Though they looked road worn, there was no edge of fight or danger in their body language. Unless they were excellent actors, she found it hard they were hired to kill her. Perhaps to abandon her, but even that was hard to believe with the amount of valuables being transported.

In her own, the books left to her were a note of spite from her uncle. Books on the origin of the Empire and its holy battle alongside gods, the origin of Garreg Mach which she would now never see, books dedicated to the growth of Sothis throughout Fodlan and her holy word. Edelgard snorted. Embarrassing as it was to admit, she had read all of it. Left in a room in the aftermath of the experiments, she had been desperate to relearn what she had once lost. It was Hubert that held her together through pieces falling apart from one another. Now, she understood reading between the lines. Books like this gave little in the spaces. She dug through the piles, throwing things out of her way with a burst of irritation in her chest, until she settled on a fictionalization of a famous Enbarr play. It wasn’t ideal, but it wouldn’t make her angry the same way supposed biographical fiction did.

It was based on a true to life event, but spun in the direction of romance. A princess and prince of the Empire and Faerghus connecting through the war that separated the two countries. Such a twist could not be further from the truth, but there were entertaining characters, and at least the playmakers of Enbarr weren’t being influenced by those like her uncle. As her carriage started north and day turned to cooler night, she read to the moment her light fell dark. Despite her misgivings, once the driver took the horses off to rest for the night, it was easier to be lulled into a quiet sleep than she expected.

If nothing else, those transporting her seemed to be interested in her continuing survival. Each morning she awoke to someone knocking at her door and offering her a basic breakfast – eggs and bacon and tea. It was a far cry from the productions her uncle would force her to attend and Edelgard gladly took advantage. She could eat in her carriage and not bother to face others, but since they didn’t ask her to, it was easier to step outside and join them each morning. It meant they could go over where she was in the journey. Their willingness to share the geography with her sealed the facts – if they knew how willing she was to run, they wouldn’t bother to inform her anything of navigation. Instead of spending her nights and mornings reading alone, she spent them watching her companions cook, and taking the time to help them chop wood. It was far lighter than her great ax, but it was an excuse to continue practicing. Some days, she feared that if she stopped moving, she would lose control of her body again, like she had in the aftermath of the experiments. Though the rough wooden handle of the chopping ax left splinters and blisters on her palms, Edelgard did not dislike the work.

Before long, their small troupe had left the main mountains cutting off Enbarr from much of the rest of the Empire. They would stop first in Varley for restock, before moving forward through the Leicester Alliance. It meant restock and momentary pause. And unfortunately, it meant visits.

“It has been some time, your majesty.” Count Varley stood at the second floor, as though flaunting his power over all who entered the house. Edelgard felt her gut sink to the floor. “How is your father doing?”

In her plotting – now her fantasies – she had stood over Count Varley with an ax, the threat of execution. In these fantasies, she would say – ‘Only so well as you left him in betrayal.’ She would hold her ax as though to behead him, and choose not to, not out of mercy. Out of strength. She would not need to kill her greatest enemies to destroy their power. She would be able to take back her life.

In the now, she forced herself into a slight curtsy. “He is well. I am sure he will appreciate you housing me for my long journey.”

He laughed and it made her want to pull the dagger from her boot and throw it into his chest. “How wonderful! I couldn’t say no to allowing the last Adrestian Princess a true dinner before she left the country!”

Edelgard played with the poisons in her skirts as she sat down to dinner with him and his daughter, wife nowhere to be seen. His daughter had messy hair and made no eye contact and it made Edelgard’s heart roil with hatred. She watched his daughter pick at food, until his sharp bark forced her to leap to attention, yelling at her to eat. Watching the abuse, Edelgard chose solidarity.

“I believe I am tired, Count Varley. If you would, may I lay down to rest?”

“Of course,” he said. “Bernadetta. If you would make yourself useful, please take her majesty to a room.”

The girl – Bernadetta – gave a quick nod and jolted out of her chair. She was out of the room before Edelgard had a chance to stand, but she did not dislike that. Following Bernadetta, Edelgard caught small views of her on the stairs and around the corner. The second flood creaked beneath her boots. At the end of the hall, Bernadetta was peering out from the threshold of the final door.

“Thank you,” Edelgard said. “I appreciate your help.”

“Y-yes,” Bernadetta responded. 

As Edelgard stood at the opening to the room, Bernadetta didn’t have much room to leave. She continued peering at her shy acquaintance, to negative effect.

Edelgard pursed her lips. “I apologize. I am simply … curious. Your father …” She wondered how safe it was to speak an opinion with the man just downstairs. “He seems rather harsh on you. I was concerned for you.”

“Great job, Bernie,” comes out as a barely audible murmur from Bernadetta’s mouth. “Just drawing attention to yourself all the time, can’t you learn to act better around company…”

“Oh, no,” Edelgard said. “It’s not you. A father isn’t someone who should be yelling at his children. …that is all. I apologize if I am intruding.”

Bernadetta shuffled her feet on the ground. “No… that’s just how it is. No need to worry…”

“…Will you be attending the Officer’s Academy in the future?” Edelgard forced a smile on her face. “If you go there, you no longer need live under your father’s thumb.”

“My father won’t …” Bernadetta’s shoulders rose, her face reddening. “I have to go.”

“Of course,” Edelgard said, but before she had the chance to say anything more, Bernadetta had bolted out of the room, squeezing past Edelgard’s side.

She watched Bernadetta go and allowed herself a small sigh. More had been hurt in the advent of nobility and crests than her family alone. In the house of Varley, Edelgard spent her supposed final night in the Empire alone with her thoughts of petty vengeance. As morning came, they outfitted her carriage with ugly dresses, a gift from the Count. In an ideal world, they would make good fuel for the fire, but their material would smoke more than light. However, she was grateful for the barrels of apples and eggs, excited to return to travelling despite herself.

“From Varley, we’re headin’ into the Leicester Alliance. You ever been there, princess?” One of her drivers points from the sun rising in the east to just north of its rays. “They got some of the most beautiful architecture in their capital, but we’ll be followin’ its southern border till we get to the mountains.”

“I see,” Edelgard murmured. “I don’t believe I have.” In her mind are vague memories of cold weather, which Hubert had filled in as likely due to her time in Faerghus. He told her she had returned with little but that dagger – that it was the last place her mother had been seen alive. She filed the thought away and asked, “How many more days till we reach another noble?” 

“Mmm…” Her driver held a hand to their face. “Imagine Ordelia’s be the best place to stop. No friend of the Empire, there.”

Edelgard laughed. “You believe someone who isn’t a friend of the empire would be a good place to stop?”

Her driver grinned. “Varley’s no friend of the people. Us commonfolk have got eyes, princess, don’t you worry. We’ve been running these roads longer’n nobles have been telling us what to do.”

She smiled back at that. As they came out of Varley and into the mountains, she found a book hidden in the dresses the Count had left. One on archery – one with a young woman’s name left at the front. As she flipped through, Edelgard found sketches of strange animals and flora, graphite smears blocking out the delicate lines. Among the drawings, she found words.

 _Sorry for being so dumb_ , was written in the margins, halfway through. _Sorry about my dad, too. I’m supposed to go away in an arranged marriage too_. In another page, she found more. _But I think you’re strong enough to run_.

An edge of tears burned at Edelgard’s eyes and she brushed them away with a harsh sigh. She wasn’t meant to get upset about small things. Rulers considered the larger picture. Yet here she was, crying for a girl she had known for less than a day. Her uncle would call her a fool. It was hard to close herself off in the face of what she needed to do to defeat the Church and the Slithering bastards who ruined her life. Especially when other young women were suffering.

If Edelgard ran now, she could probably make her way back. But that meant running through Varley land, Aegir land. No friends to her father. If she had decided to run sooner, her uncle would just put her inside another carriage, with tighter security. If she made it to Almyra before running, she’d have an entire country to travel back across. Her normal machinations ground to a halt as though rust had slithered its way into her mind.

“I may have nowhere to return,” she muttered. She watched open fields pass and their transformation into rivers and smaller villages. Her head against the glass, she could feel her mind slipping through with the rumble of the carriage. She needed a plan that didn’t depend on her home. Edelgard stuck her head out of the window. “You said Ordelia is no friend of the Empire, right?”

“May’ve said something like that.”

“Good.”

A river came to pass, alongside a massive bridge – the Bridge of Myrddin. From behind the curtains of her window, there was only a slight difference in aspects of the people’s fashion. While nobility was likely the same anywhere one goes in Fodlan, there were no important nobles who controlled the city of the bridge. It was a strange moment of the blend between the Alliance and the Empire – as though there was no difference in the rule of the land between them.

Rather than going deeper into land, the carriage followed the road at the Airmid River. While they stopped to rest the same time each night, she started waking earlier to the smell of freshly grilled fish. Fish were not uncommon in Enbarr, but fresh water fish from a river were an entirely different experience from the royal offerings – let alone grilled fish cooked over a campfire. Being outside of Imperial land made Edelgard bold. She spent more time outside, aiding in the cleaning, attempting to learn how to fish. In moments of breakfast and dinner, it was as though she could temporarily forget her status and the journey she was taking, to imagine a life where this was all she did. Watched people and met people and cooked with people. The moments would pass quickly, but she relished them all the same.

Entering the county of Ordelia was like crossing a threshold. Willow trees took the sides of the road with gentle shade from the sun. It was a hint of ease for Edelgard, whose face burned easily and quickly. Violets and other purple flora took much of the region otherwise. Though the roads were well-trodden and cared for, there was an over-grown quality to the area. Properly managed, it would have easily surpassed most Adrestian holdings. However, there were few people who seemed to live in the minor villages they passed. At the end of a long road, they stopped at a house that stood alone from the villages. It was nothing like that of most nobles – while it was two stories, unlike a typical commoner’s home, it didn’t stretch out far like Aegir’s would have. Most of the land was taken by botany. Yet, her drivers stopped as though positive of its importance.

Edelgard helped herself out of her cabin and began to stride towards the house. Her leading driver, however, ran in front of her, a hand to their lips.

“It’d be best if one of us knocked. You know.”

She bit her lip. “Fine.” After so much independence, it was easy to forget that she, as an Imperial princess, was not supposed to act out and knock on strangers’ doors.

Edelgard stood back from the door, at the bottom of the porch stairs, and nodded to her drivers. They rapped on the door, polite and loud. It was not answered by a servant. Instead, someone in fine clothes and gray hair appeared, peering at the small crowd from behind tiny glasses.

“’Ello, good sir Ordelia!” Her lead driver grinned. “We’ve come bearing gifts and a visitor. The lady Edelgard I think wanted a short visit with y’all.”

The man – Count Ordelia she assumed – took in the view from the doorway, from the drivers and down to Edelgard. She felt a chill of dread prickle up her skin as he stared at her. She had not thought to ask why they disliked the Empire, and it occurred to her a moment late that she was not familiar with all of her father’s policies.

“The Adrestian princess,” the count said. It came out like fear and cold acceptance molded into one familiar feeling. She nodded and gave a better attempt at a curtsy than she’d bothered to give Varley. He kept staring at her, and day could have turned to night as he said, “Fine…don’t stand out there. I suspect you want to come inside.”

The inside of their home was not ostentatious. Edelgard found it somewhat comforting to see nobility that didn’t tear its people apart for the mere appearance of wealth. It stood at stark odds with Count Varley’s manor, without chandeliers and paintings covering every surface. Where there were portraits, it appeared as smaller pictures of people with similar purple eyes – family, she presumed. Surfaces were accompanied in a familiar violet cloth – but it was not silk. Count Ordelia gestured to a common room, featuring a small tea table and straw chairs at each side. Not the sort of room for a private meeting, but instead intended merely for entertaining guests. As Edelgard sat, he poured tea for the two of them.

“May I ask why the Imperial princess has made her way to our domain?” he asked, tight and quiet.

She took the tea first, unsure of its scent. “I am … traveling, one could say.”

“For your father?” he asked.

She allowed herself a moment of silence by sipping at the tea. Floral and subtle behind a familiar flavor reminiscent of black tea. Finally, she said, “No. This has nothing to do with him.”

Count Ordelia seemed to relax at that, taking his own teacup. “I apologize for such a question. Our family had what we could call … a disagreement with your father in the past. Though I despise describing it as such. We became involved in something we perhaps should not have. Helping a family attempt to secede. …Regardless, I should not bring blame upon the daughter for something of her father. You seem similar in age to my Lysithea.” His eyes lingered on her hair. Edelgard defensively pushed it away from her face. 

“I’m fifteen,” she said. “Close enough to an adult.”

“In some eyes,” he answered. The count took a long draft of tea. “I had assumed the Emperor wouldn’t use his own children for crest experimentation, however.”

Edelgard’s eyes shot wide open despite herself. “He would never-” she spat, but bit her tongue to stop herself. She pushed a hand over her face. She needed to be an adult. A thousand years older than she was now. Giving even that much was far too much information. “I don’t know what you are talking about. I apologize. When you said experimentation, I assumed you meant something abusive, and …I have a great deal of respect for my father.”

“Ah, and your father is not abusive, then,” he murmured. His tone gave her goosebumps. The count’s eyes floated to a portrait on the wall – to a girl with purple eyes and white hair. “Perhaps I assume where I should not.”

Edelgard stared at the portrait, a well of dread pooling in her gut. “No,” she whispered.

“After … our family chose to aid Hyrm, your father’s empire did not look well upon our family.” He huffed a short laugh. “I suppose I am lucky I am not one of those killed. If you could call this lot luck.”

“My father wasn’t …” Edelgard’s dry lips threatened to bleed from the pressure of her teeth upon them. “That was not his doing. He was not involved in that.”

“That? Do you mean the punishment toward Hyrm and Ordelia, or … some other slip of the tongue,” he said. “Regardless. It was his government that threatened Hyrm. His government that saw fit to punish Ordelia. It has been … eleven years now, I suppose. Since they took my children. …I do not know why your father would do to you what he did to my family, but I assume you are under the impression it was someone else’s decision. I apologize, because while I know you are young, you seem smart beyond your years. I feel it would be … criminal if I were not honest to you, here and now.”

It matched. The Insurrection was still a fresh wound on her memories, having happened so recently. Eleven years ago, Edelgard was only four. She barely remembered most of her life before the crest was implanted, but the time frame matched up. Her father still had power, then. Her father would have had to be the one to make the command. To punish Hyrm and anyone who dared aid them.

“But my father couldn't have known about them …” She paused, feeling foolish in the nickname she and Hubert had given the slithering bastards. “He tried to fight the scientists for me.”

“Those people who performed crest experiments? All I know is they were mixed in with the Imperial lot that came to keep an eye on the remains of our family. But I can’t say anything in absolute.” Count Ordelia stared out the window. “No one is interested in the words of a faded family who has lost every heir.”

“What of your daughter,” Edelgard said. She saw herself, almost, in those portraits. An ailing father almost present in the man opposite her. “If she survived, I’m sure she could find allies in your defense.” The words came out of her mouth despite the fact that the enemy was so close to her.

He gave her a small smile, as though staring at a child. It made her ill. “I could never force Lysithea to take our name into the future. Not after what she has been forced to experience.”

“You said it was eleven years ago,” Edelgard murmured. “She was only two?”

“Indeed,” he said. “I had wondered what happened to the Imperial line. Little news makes it this far. I’m surprised they allowed you out of the castle. …Or maybe I’m the fool for playing my hand so openly to an imperial princess,” he laughed.

“I owe nothing to the empire as it stands now,” she said. “Not after what they have done to my family. Nor to anyone else. I will speak nothing of our conversation.” The actual reason for her wanting to come – she had never imagined the count would so immediately see through her. “But I wanted to ask … a favor of a sort. That is why I stopped here. ...I need the ear of someone who would not ally with Adrestia.”

“We owe nothing to the Empire,” Count Ordelia said. “I cannot grant you a favor. …But I could listen to a request.”

It was hard to swallow. “I am being married off. I … still do not know of the details. I assumed this was an excuse to have me killed in transit, or on arrival, if the people pulling the strings have lost any use for me. Because of that, I am going to Almyra. You are right and I think I would be a fool to ask you for protection or to help me run away." She felt embarrassed, now, that she had dared to show her face to someone who despised her father so. "…instead I wanted to ask you if …” Edelgard trailed off. The thought of her father's crimes took away her typical edge. She meant to be strong as steel through every struggle, but she had not considered him being complicit before. He had been the goal at the end of her path for so long. Before Count Ordelia, however, she felt like a teenager. It made her mind fog over. “If anything happens in Almyra, would you be willing to temporarily house me.”

“You say you do not want protection, and then you ask for just that,” he said, eyebrow raised. However, it is not cruel. Just bemused. “I could consider it, if you were to renounce your claim to the Imperial throne. You would blend in well with my daughter. However, I doubt that you would be willing to do that.”

“You are correct,” Edelgard said.

“Then at most, I will offer you this. If need comes, and you are fearful for your life. I can offer good word for you in Derdriu. No one need know who you are, provided a noble points out a need for shelter. Word doesn’t pass frequently from the Alliance to the Empire. I assume you were given goods before you left, to be given to your betrothed. You could sell them in the capital and survive for some time, I assume. Provided you have it in you to hide yourself, that would be your best outlook for survival.”

She let out a breath she did not realize she was holding. “Thank you.” It was minuscule. But it was more than she had before. “If worst comes to worst, I will send word. I will not come here. I will not draw any more attention than I already have.” In the back of her mind were apologies and fear for his daughter, but Edelgard could not bring herself to speak of it – there mere thought of seeing someone else affected made her mind drip into the memories of her dying siblings. “I will take my leave.”

“We have space for your people and yourself to stay the night if you so wish,” the count said. “It is rare that we have pleasant visitation these days. I will ask my wife, but I doubt she would be troubled.”

Edelgard’s eyes lingered on the portrait of Lysithea. “…I don’t want to raise suspicion. If my suitor expects me at a particular time, he may alert my uncle if I am late. I can’t bring you anymore trouble.”

“Then I hope we may meet again under better circumstances,” he said. “I appreciate your time, Edelgard.” Dispensing with formality and station.

She didn’t dislike it. “I appreciate yours.”

As they packed in to leave, the count held up a hand. Behind him, someone had brought a small box of goods – basic fruits like berries and more advanced treats like honey. He handed another bag, small but full, to Edelgard directly. It wasn’t until after they left that she had the chance to look into it, nervous at its contents. The first thing she noticed was clothes. Simple cotton that was stretchy and comfortable in her hands, they had given her pants and long-sleeve shirts to match, as though he could guess there was something to hide on her skin. At the bottom, though, was the greatest gift – a book on magic and spell-weaving. Inside, she found his daughter’s name and a small note.

_She’s become sick of this old book and has been wanting to give it away to someone who may value it. As you owe me a favor, we decided that person would have to be you._

Edelgard clutched the book to her chest before gently placing it beside the one Bernadetta had given her.

Though night was beginning to close in, her troupe made sure to leave Ordelia territory before tearing down the carriage to rest. While the drivers had not noticed any trackers during the journey, being so close to Imperial territory made it difficult to resist the concern of watchful eyes. Within two days, they had reached Goneril territory, and the path to Fodlan’s Throat. Through the window, Edelgard observed the garrison’s towering presence from afar – it was built for flying and riding, with plenty of area for archers to take aim and find protection. While wyvern bowmen seemed like somewhat of a dangerous oxymoron, the Alliance had been inspired by Almyran usage and begun to adopt aspects of their formations to surprising effect. Archery was less an art in the Empire, where more people focused on magic and cavalry formation. As her carriage drove up a circuitous mountain path, soldiers began to take notice. At the mouth of the garrison, soldiers took formation, with one larger individual stepping out from the gates.

“Hail!” The leading figure – a general, she supposed – removed a helmet to unveil bright pink hair. “To what do we owe the honor of an Imperial carriage coming to our lovely fortress?”

Her drivers fumbled, but Edelgard climbed out of the carriage first, with a letter in hand. “I was told my family had worked out the details of our crossing in advance with House Riegan.” She held out the certificate, and the general took it with a glint of interest in his eye. “I am traveling to Almyra to meet with a noble of the court.”

“Oh, I heard about this!” he said, giddy excitement pitching his voice up. “Hilda couldn’t stop talking about the marriage arranged between the Imperial Princess and Almyra, goddess gracious.” He walked around her, nodding. “You would be quite the catch, I see. Well, of course, you need to be on your way, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Edelgard said, a frigid tone in her voice. “I am expected much too soon to be held up here.”

The general clapped his hands together. “Open the gates!” As Edelgard turned to reenter her carriage, though, he stopped her. “Did they tell you much of Almyra?” 

“Unfortunately, no,” she said. “I am aware they appreciate strength. I am also aware that they have never been an ally to Fodlan. Beyond that, I have been told nothing.”

“It is not that they like strength. They require it,” he responded. “I doubt they would endanger the life of a crown princess, but I will say. I am deeply surprised they agreed to allow anyone from Fodlan into their court willingly. It could be good for you. They may change their minds and sent you back.”

“I’m not trying to-“

“But that would mean no wedding, and I do hear exciting things about their weddings.” He laughed. “Certainly, certainly, princess. Now, off you go. Bring ever lasting peace!”

Edelgard is loaded back into her carriage, lingering on the general’s words. She leaned to the front of the carriage and whispered, “Who was that?”

“Holst Goneril,” her driver answered. “Can’t say he knows that much about Almyrans, but he sure does fight a lot of ‘em.”

The journey into Almyra was mountains, at first. Mountains and valleys and well-trodden land. This had not been a trade region. Throughout the valley, Edelgard could see the remains of swords and arrows, armor left behind in a rush. There were no bodies. Her driver explained that even in wartime, Almyra did what they could to have bodies returned to surviving family. After battles, even the Alliance forces would be allowed to take back what had been lost on the battlefield. The sense to senselessness made her head spin. This was unlike the war she had planned to wage, but it nonetheless felt familiar. It was fought by people and no one else.

As the mountains began to disappear, the region turned to flatland. There were far less mountains than in her homeland, with grass and earth stretching out as far as the eye could see. The path they took led them through small villages, noticeably different from both the Adrestian and Alliance towns she had observed. Their clothing was looser and more flowing, more similar between men and women than expected. People wore colorful sashes around their bodies and heads, and Edelgard began to realize how strongly the sun beat down across the region. None of them seemed sunburned by its constant rays, however, with warm brown skin handling the weather well. If it were in passing, it would remind her of Brigid and the first time she met the princess, wearing cooling clothing utterly different from that Edelgard was required to wear. However, though there were basic similarities, their fashion was wholly different – wholly itself. Since the land was so flat, it was easy to see how few trees there were, with brush and shorter flora taking up the majority of the land she had seen thusfar. Even their buildings spoke to that, with little dependence on wood, and more on stone and other brightly colored brick materials.

More than that, she realized she could not understand a word they said.

While her carriage was able to travel through without being stopped, the citizens took no issue in staring as they passed through. Edelgard forced herself to sit back. It was no good to linger on what she could not change. Though they ran short on supplies, they stopped by a small lake and took the time to fish for food. 

“Have you all traveled through this region before?” she asked quietly one night.

Her lead driver stoked the camp fire. “Got stuck up here in a skirmish once. King opened up trade routes, but there’s always some fightin’ still. Can’t say we know the language, but we had goods and that speaks louder’n words sometimes. Since then, we’ve been working a few routes through here. Imagine that’s why your family hired us. Probly couldn’t find anyone else.”

As the days passed, warmer each time, Edelgard found she was grateful for the pants Ordelia had given her. Wearing them among the three drivers, she would blend in perfectly if not for the shock of white hair always shining on her head. They expected little of her and it was a strange experience to slowly lose the terrible burden of fate that had been crushing her for the last two years. Dread still welled in her chest. It would not last forever. They were nearing their destination.

One day, her leading driver opened the front of her cabin and nodded to her. “We're coming up soon, milady. You'd best be prepared.”

“You mean...?” Edelgard said.

They gestured to the land in front of the carriages, still taken by the savanna around. “The capital. We're almost there.” 

For all the time she had been given to prepare, Edelgard felt her heart catch in her chest. No book could prepare her to meet someone she planned to kill. She changed from the loose cotton pants she'd been wearing since they left Ordelia's land into one of the many dresses her uncle outfitted her with. The poison vials fit into pockets Hubert had taken to sew. Keeping them on her person felt safer. Even if they searched her, she could have the excuse of defense. Ideally, however, they would not lay hands on a fiance of nobility. That was her hope. The books she kept lay strewn helplessly around the carriage. There was little time to rectify the mess. More important than that – she looked to the top of her carriage.

As they pulled into the city, it transformed from untouched land to buildings and stands in the time it took Edelgard to blink. There were no immediate walls surrounding the outer city, nor moats and rivers. Here, no one paid heed to another short line of carriages running through the streets, and she found herself grateful that her uncle had no time to outfit it with Imperial regalia. The palace itself was both small and ostentatious. It did not take too much space of the city square, but it held strong with polished walls and arches. Flags waved like ribbons in the wind. While there were few soldiers surrounding it, there was an aura of strength. While it seemed unlikely war would reach this area, it was built with the expectation that even an earthquake would be unable to destroy it. 

The carriage came to a jerky stop. Edelgard forced herself to sit down and smooth out her skirts. It occurred to her how filthy her hair must be after traveling so long. Her eyes landed on a sash her uncle had given her in guise of warning. She smoothed her hair into a messy braid and wrapped what was left in the silken cloth. If nothing else, it was cooling to no longer have hair sticking to her neck. White hair likely meant little to Almyra. Regardless, she couldn't go in showing all her secrets bare.

Outside, she heard the driver calling out something she couldn't understand. It was awkward, but she recognized it as an accented recreation of the language she had seen the people speaking. In the midst of it, she recognized one word - “Fodlan!” Someone, presumably a guard, picked up on that. The name of her country became a quiet chorus around her, boxing her in further. The voices grew further as the phrase hopped away and toward the castle.

“Now, we wait,” her driver whispered. 

With the cart still, no wind came through the cracks any longer. Still air built up around her until she wasn't sure she was breathing in air any longer. One could call it fear, but Edelgard refused to. She steeled herself, hand gripped around the only support she had left. It was anticipation.

“Now presenting, the Princess Edelgard of Fodlan!” 

She huffed under her breath, as if to laugh. Only the princess of the Adrestian Empire and even that was arguable now.

The door opened before she could linger and Edelgard took her first step out into the Almyran capital. Before the next, she slammed the hilt of her great ax on the ground, till its vibration echoed in her bones. Each step she took came with another ring from its metal edge and her muscles strained with excitement. Its weight was unfamiliar to her after weeks of travel. Regardless, she could not forfeit the opportunity to prove herself. Twenty steps away stood a tall man at the base of the castle's stairs, arms crossed to his chest, and long hair carefully braided behind his well manicured beard.

“I am the Princess Edelgard,” she said, nodding her head, but not bowing. “From the empire of Adrestia in Fodlan. I thank you for your presence.” 

The man glanced from her face, the sash around her head, the undershirt pulled fully up her neck, the gloves she wore in the heat, and then – to the ax in her hand. This, he took time to examine, far longer than the brief analyzing gaze he gave her.

“I assume you know how to use that ax,” he said, impeccable and lightly rounded in his enunciation. 

“I would be glad to show you,” Edelgard said.

At that, his neutral stare turned into a smirk. His hand trailed over to the sword at his side. “My name is Nader, miss Edelgard. I'll have to inform you, a heavy weapon isn't the best thing to bring to a one-on-one fight.”

“And good thing, too, because she's not fighting anyone right now,” said a voice from behind him. 

A pinch of annoyance in his brow, Nader turned around. “The king send our little soft heart to tattle?”

The voice belonged to someone who seemed to pretend to be a man, but was much more that of a boy. As Edelgard took her eyes from Nader's sword to the interloper, she found someone strangely close to her own age. He had to be younger than Hubert, but Hubert could have appeared as a thirty year old man when he was 12. That was no challenge. This stranger had similar deep brown hair to Nader, with a short braid at the side of his head, but a clean face that had never been shaved. Nor was he particularly tall, she noted as he walked closer. Edelgard considered herself a growing young woman, but this stranger almost seemed short to her, particularly in comparison to Nader.

“No, he sent a proper translator to talk to the guest, instead of a combat instructor who would rather have a duel and turn a princess into the new leader of the guard,” the stranger said playfully.

“If you can handle her, little one,” Nader said and harshly ruffled the boy's hair. “No casual guest brings an ax to tea party.”

“Well, if you like her that much, I'll consider it a good sign,” the boy said. “Come on, you've got swords to train and students to stab most days, you can use all the free time you can get.”

“Fine, fine. But when the lass cuts off your toes, you needn't run to me for aid,” Nader said, and she noted that it was almost warm.

Regardless, Edelgard kept her ax tall. “May I ask who you are,” she said, carving coldness into her tone.

“Oh, simply your royal translator,” he said with a grand flourish. “If you'd like, you can call me Claude. I hear that's not an unpopular name in your country.”

“Is that your real name?” she asked. Weariness set into her bones from what little she'd had to speak to him.

“Oh, what's in a name,” he said. “Real or not, that's what I'd like you to call me. I'd say that's fair, princess.”

Edelgard frowned. “Fine. Claude it is. I appreciate that they sent a translator, but it appeared the man Nader was handling the situation fine prior to your appearance. His knowledge of my language is just as good as yours.”

Claude clicked his tongue. “Well, the King can't spend one of his best men on a case like welcoming and training the new princess. Why do that when he could send me instead. All the benefits and none of the payroll.” He moved to put an arm around her shoulder and she visibly flinched despite herself. His eyes flickered from her body to her face, and he put his arm down. “Besides, I'm much better at Fodlan speak than Nader is. The man is all training all the way down, and if you start talking courtesies and hobby to him, everything goes in one ear and out the other.” Claude began to walk down the stairs, nodding his head toward her carriage. “If you're going to learn, you should really be learning from the best.”

“Learning what,” Edelgard called out. She found herself glad she had kept the poisons in her skirts. “I was told I was to be married here, in Almyra. A political agreement between my country and yours.”

“Is that what it is?” Claude called back, taking his sweet time to meander around her carriage. “Hadn’t heard that part.”

“What do you mean,” she said.

“Well, all I know is I need to teach you my language before you can be married off,” he said, peering his head inside her carriage. “Oh. Wow. Mind if I take a look at these books?”

Edelgard gave him a curt nod and he gave her a grin in return. Sitting at the open door, he dug through the pile she had unceremoniously created. “I don’t expect my appearance to be broad common knowledge, but I will say, I expected at least the royal court to know the terms of agreement.”

“Princess, I’m fifteen,” Claude said, eyes glancing at her from behind a book. “You think they’re going to let me be privy to all their plans and plotting.”

She would say yes if it were herself. “No,” she conceded.

“You would be right, if I let that stop me,” he went on, distracted by the tome. “Since I’m not being paid by the king, I’m sure you wouldn’t mind if I took these off your hands as payment, would you?”

She sighed, exasperated. “No, I would not, I have read them far too many times for them to hold meaning any longer. I digress. I understand that you may have your orders, but I would like nothing more than to meet my fiancé and finish what I set out here to do.”

Instead of answering her, Claude took to piling the books of the carriage in his hands. “You think the driver could bring the rest around to the stable? Or do you want to help.”

She blinked at him. “I can … have them driven around, yes.” Edelgard surprised herself by walking up and taking a few off the top. “But at least tell me when I am expected to meet my fiancé.”

He sniffled. “I could tell you, but I’m not supposed to know. …Alright. I get you’re not going to trust a stranger you’ve just met. I really do.” Claude put down his pile and leaned a shoulder against it with impeccable balance. “But you’re going to have to give me a little time. Learn the language. I doubt this is the first one you’ve needed to know. You’re going to need a toolset and that ax isn’t going to cut it. Even if Nader thinks it will. So let’s get inside, and get you set up, and then you’ll have the chance to get everything you want and more.” He pressed a finger to the bridge of her nose. “Before you turn into a lobster.”

Though it was a light touch, she felt her skin burn on contact. “A lobster?”

“I’ll tell you about those too, princess. Later,” he yelled, already heading up the stairs.

Edelgard stared after him, mouth open and almost prepared to yell she knew exactly what a lobster was. Instead, she swallowed her frustration and took his words in stride. They weren’t unkind, even if they weren’t what she was hoping for. She looked back to her driver, who gave her a polite shrug. “To the stables, I suppose,” she called up to them. As they drove away, she lingered on the sight of home, and walked up the stairs into Almyra’s crowning castle.


	2. because i'm not scared of the shadows

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note: a lot of the concepts here are pulled from this (https://rorvk.tumblr.com/post/186830710067/fire-emblem-three-houses-middle-eastcentral) cool breakdown of influences on Claude's design and Almyra itself. We don't know a lot about it and I'm just running by the seat of my pants, so we've got this weird mix as noted here. I doubt IS did that much research, to be frank, so that made this harder considering how vague they are. Oh well.

Edelgard side-stepped the sweep of Nader’s sword by balancing her weight around the base of her great ax. The benefit of using such a large weapon was not only its weight or stability – when Nader brought his sword up against, the blade of her ax caught his strike like a shield. The backlash of vibration from his strength felt terrible on her arms, but it was better than bleeding.

“Very nice!” he yelled. “Fodlan maintains its reputation with axes.”

“It is the Adrestian way,” she said, sweating through her cotton clothes. Thus far, it had been simple to keep her hair bound over her head. A week had passed and no one had commented on it. Whether it was a normal style of wear or whether they were all still gauging her was yet to be decided – but the way that Claude never sat too close to her made it clear to her that he at least did not trust her either. Dispelling her mind of the thought, she said to Nader, “I doubt most of Fodlan could rival our technique with axes.”

“Oh,” he said. “The general at the border is quite the genius with an ax. You don’t know him?”

A flash of pink appeared in her head. “He’s an ax master?”

“You say that as if you don’t believe it,” Nader laughed. Sheathing his sword, he pulled the water skin from his side and offered it to her. “One could say much the same of an Adestan youngling like you.”

Edelgard took the skin without comment and began to drink. Though Nader was highly intelligent, she had begun to see what Claude meant when he said the man was not concerned about perfect fluency of her language. He wasn’t particularly worried about the difference between Fodlan’s countries, nor was he concerned about pronouncing her country’s name correctly. Though she had considered correcting him, it had quickly occurred to her that her horrid pronunciation of the most basic Almyran terms gave her little credence to comment on someone else’s speaking.

Since arriving, she had spent more time with Nader and Claude than most in the palace. She didn’t know how many spoke her language, but Edelgard wasn’t allowed to leave her room without Claude offering an arm as escort, either. Time spent with Nader was better spent. Someone who could hold a sword to her throat without showing a hint of killing intent was surprisingly trust-worthy. More than that, having the great ax back in her arms felt like taking a brace off after a long period of healing.

“Most children are trained to fight where I am from,” Edelgard said. She returned the drained skin to him, watching the interested smile stretch to his eyes. “In the Imperial family, it is of no small importance for those in line to the throne to know how to fight. We could be called to war at any moment.”

“Very good,” he said. “Your country didn’t have a sense for battle when our forces first met. It is nice to hear that’s changed since then.”

“That was a century ago,” she said.

“Plenty of things refuse to change after a century,” Nader said. “If you listen, that soft hearted boy will talk your ear off about the subject.”

“He cares so much, I suppose?” Edelgard asked.

“The boy cares more about what does not change than what is changing before his eyes,” Nader said. “I’m not here to wag tongues, little princess. I see you’ve been well taught with the ax, but if you are going to spend time in Almyra, you are going to need to take up the bow.”

“Oh,” she said.

In a toothy grin, she could see his chipped teeth, likely from battle and difficult landings. Nader said, “You’ve a chance better than most younglings. A bow takes strong arms. The rest, we’ll just have to see if your talent shows up anywhere else.”

After spending a long day with Nader, fingers pounding with the beginnings of blisters in areas she didn’t realize could blister, Edelgard was escorted back to her room. While it was certainly nice, with a small bathing area to the side and a comfortable bed low to the floor, all of the belongings her uncle sent with her were unceremoniously piled up in the center of the room. Claude peered his head around the small mountain. A book was in his hand, as ever.

“Evening, princess!” he said. “Is Nader giving you a proper Almyran welcome?”

“If you mean to ask whether he is besting me in combat, the answer would be yes.” She did not collapse on the ground – instead, Edelgard took petite steps, avoiding using most of the muscles in her legs. She sat on the edge of her bed and allowed the air to deflate from her body. For every strike she had countered had been the clear fact Nader was holding back. “I can see why the man is revered.”

“He teaches everyone in the palace,” Claude said absently. “They should really be thanking you for falling on that sword, for the time being.”

“I did not intend needing to sacrifice myself for the people of another country.” If he were not in the room, Edelgard would flop onto her bed and pass out. Unfortunately, here he was, and it meant maintaining a different sort of consciousness. “Is there a particular reason you are in my room?”

“Gotta finish going through your belongings. I can’t just take things without your permission, you know. The king would have my hide.” Claude clapped his book shut and raised it in front of her face. “Can I have this one?”

“Yes,” Edelgard said wearily. “It’s just another book on the central church of Fodlan. Which most of them will be.” Her uncle had nothing if not his sense of humor.

“Not a religious person, huh,” he said.

“I suppose you could say that,” she answered, chillier with each word.

If Claude read into the tone of her voice, he made no obvious note of it. Instead, he sprung to his feet and dug his arms into the pile before them. At her behest and perhaps also apathy, her drivers had been kind enough to deliver the goods of her carriage to her room with little care. In an ideal world, she could burn the contents outside the palace. Unfortunately, Edelgard lived in her uncle’s world, and a new princess burning a carriage full of artisan goods out of spite was a minor piece of news that had the potential to make its way across borders. The pile was every piece of literature and clothing and ugly jewelry had been left in her carriage. The second carriage, as locked and noted by her uncle, was intended for her betrothed and locked securely in the stables below until the wedding was set.

Claude’s face lit up and he dragged a large and unpleasant looking piece of clothing from the stack. One of the dresses from Vestra, she realized late. He whistled. “I didn’t expect these kinds of dresses to be to your taste, princess.”

Edelgard turned her nose up at the sight of it. “I think you’ll find no one likes those dresses. Not even the people who made them. The only reason they were created was to feed the ego of a man who enjoyed torturing young women.”

Claude pulled the ugly silken dresses up to his chest. “Fodlan sure sounds like a great place from your description, then.”

“I’m sure,” she muttered. “The most you could get out of those dresses is the material that was originally hacked into those grotesque shapes.”

“So you’re saying I can have these too?” He balled up the dress and tossed it over into a corner that had been summarily marked as ‘his.’ “You’re too kind with your payments!”

Though the room as a whole was beginning to take place as ‘hers,’ however temporarily the term was in the face of marriage, it was marked by two halves. One corner was items sorted that Edelgard planned to keep. Her dresses from her personal stash, the clothes from Ordelia, what little Hubert had smuggled in with her, and such. The other was the pile of ugly curiosities and books that Claude deemed curious enough to select for further investigation. His excuse was how hard it was to get Fodlan goods in the capital, “Let alone things from the Adrestian empire! The most I’ve heard is how great its opera house is.” 

“It is quite good.” It was a stilted response, but the best Edelgard could manage. Despite his promise, most of their time together had been marked thus far by attempts to sort out her moving mess. “I lived quite nearby.” She trailed off at the thought. “My uncle took me when I was a child. I doubt I could ever forget it.” The memory was clearer than the loss of her siblings, somehow, clearer even than her mother’s face. The theater and its orchestra, with their star singer Manuela coming to the forefront. Behind her eyes, she could see from the balcony, mages casting spotlight over the actors, and the vibration of the music to her bones.

“Do all Adrestians look so forlorn about music? Or is that just you,” Claude interrupted.

At his voice, she was back in the present, sweating underneath the silk wrapped around her hair, and horribly cognizant of how filthy she was. “Your jokes are not particularly funny,” Edelgard answered.

“Just trying to lighten the mood,” he said. “If the king hears I’m making our esteemed guest depressed, I’ll be locked in the dungeon with only picture books to read. And princess. I’ll have you know. That would kill me.”

His words came across clearly as a joke, but she shook her head. “You’re not going to be imprisoned over me.”

“You can say that, but that’s even more boring than the lack of meaningful reading material,” Claude said. “And in reality, what he’d do is make me go back to training with Nader for another year, which is definitely the worse fate.”

“Nader adores you,” she muttered. Her exhaustion made her honest. “It cannot be that bad.”

At that, Claude looked at her. His green eyes met hers for a brief moment before she chose to stare at the pile instead. Edelgard read the bindings of books and counted the cracks in the floor in the silence that filled the room. Finally, he said, “I guess not,” and turned back to the pile.

When night had taken too much light, Claude took what he asked for and left her room. Though the door was not locked, she felt it may as well have been. Her room was on the fourth floor. Though she had pillows, there was one sheet left to her bed, and little else she could easily use to make a rope to the ground. Outside her window were the garden and its walls, alongside quarters for workers and the children she had seen living on grounds. And to go out the door meant passing every stranger who only knew her as a bride meant to be kept to the castle.

Edelgard took each night as another one to count and allowed herself to sleep. She could catastrophize about lost time or she could accept what space she had to live and be patient. Though Claude had promised her information, the only time they had spent together was spent on basic phrases – how to tell someone she was in pain or sick, how to ask for the bathroom, and how to address royalty. He did not trust her enough to give her anything more, and she did not trust him enough to ask. Edelgard buried her face in a pillow and despite her anxieties, passed out.

After spending the majority of a week training through the days with Nader, she had been mandated rest days. These meant Edelgard stayed in her room and Claude usually came to bother her with minutiae of the country. Today, he knocked on the door, and it opened with a stranger behind him, carrying a tray. He waved and gestured her over to the balcony overhang. After he said something to the stranger, they placed the tray on a table and gave a short bow to both Claude and Edelgard before leaving. She noted Claude’s frown at the gesture as they sat down.

“I heard you’d been eating with Nader most mornings,” he said, opening the lid to something similar to a kettle. He took a small hand strainer from off the tray and put it over a cup before pouring in what had an unmistakable scent of pine.

“You don’t have someone else to take breakfast with?” she asked, somewhat suspicious. Edelgard had intended to spend her first solitary morning observing the grounds. She’d little time to examine her situation since arriving, but every moment she had free time, Claude had appeared like a bad dream to accompany her.

He chuckled. “I don’t have many fans around here, princess. Anyway, I’ve heard in Fodlan, nobles make a big to-do about eating with each other for meals, and all that, but what we have for nobles really don’t care about that. So I figured there is no better opportunity to learn than over breakfast.”

Edelgard took his response as it stood and swished her tea around. “What kind of leaves was this made with?”

“Pine needles,” he said. “There aren’t a massive variety of teas here, but there has been a jump lately from boosted trade from Fodlan. You probably aren’t familiar with this one. The needles are dried prior to being steeped overnight, then you strain as you pour. So, pretty simple. There are a few other drinks I could have brought, but this would be the most familiar to you.” He sliced open something that looked like a citrus fruit, but its skin was considerably tougher than what she’d seen imported. Taking a slice, he squeezed its juice into his tea and stirred it in. When he moved to drink it, Claude stared at her from behind the teacup. “Well? Go ahead.” 

Edelgard clenched the folds of her pants. As if reading her mind, he chuckled and took a drink. “Fine,” she said. She took a slice of the fruit and let herself make the leap. The first thing she tasted was the sweet sour of the citrus. After that came the bitter pine, but as she let it mingle, the two balanced each other out. More than that, it made her head feel the clearest it had been since she’d arrived. Edelgard put down the cup and stared at it. “I suppose it isn’t bad.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment!” Claude said with a laugh. “There’s a few things otherwise I can show you. What do you normally drink in Adrestia?”

“Tea, as you guessed,” she muttered. “At dinners, wine is a frequent side with water. Certain juices, like pomegranate, are popular, I suppose.”

“That’s it?” he asked.

“Unfortunately, while I was considered the crown princess, I was not offered a great deal of variety. If you ask out of curiosity for my country, your best resource is likely going to be those books you have taken off my hands.” She glanced to the food on the table, a rumble of hunger in her stomach. “Is this something of a flat bread?”

Claude frowned again, but didn’t push his line of questioning. “You could call it that. It’s unleavened, so it doesn’t rise. You have your choice of cheese and jams to spread on it. Unfortunately, breakfast is really the only time of day food is this easy because everything else takes a decent amount of effort to prepare.”

“So why doesn’t your nobility eat together? That doesn’t sound terribly different from my country. Typically, only close family eats together. Many of the house heads tend to take their dinner apart in their offices,” Edelgard said.

He exhaled through his nose. “Oh, princess, if you only knew the half of it.” Claude took his share of food and started eating. “You might wanna start on this sooner than later, it dries out pretty quick. You can still rehydrate it, but in my opinion, there’s nothing like it fresh. That is the one benefit of living here. You have a place to sleep and you always have decent food to eat.”

“Then tell me half of it,” Edelgard said. He pushed the rest of the tray toward her, his own mouth full. Setting her jaw straight, she started, “Yes, Claude, I will eat, but I need you to listen. From my perspective, I am here with you because I need to learn how to survive. I would rather not be thrown into marriage with a stranger from a different country without any understanding of the differences or nuance. I gladly accept your help for that. However, if you continue putting off giving me meaningful information, I doubt that you plan to help me at all. I concede that there is only so much you are allowed to tell me. With that in mind, I have one thing to request. When I ask straight-forward questions about regular cultural aspects like eating, I would truly appreciate you being as straight-forward in return.”

“Wow,” he said, chewing his food. “That’s pretty well said. Guess you’ve been thinking about that for a while.”

“Yes,” she answered in a more heated tone than she intended.

“Alright. If you look at common households, large families live together and work together to make lunch and dinner, and will typically eat at once. Smaller villages outside of this city will often work together among each other to support maintaining food output, because it’s easier to prepare a larger amount of food at once than it is for a dozen small families to do it alone.” Claude paused. “But I guess you could say the reason our ‘nobility’ doesn’t eat together is because they don’t trust each other for it. I’m sure that’s nothing new to you, either, but assassination isn’t unpopular here. Does that answer your question?”

“Thank you,” she said. “It does.”

“Glad you’re not phased at the whole assassination bit,” Claude said.

“It is no less common in my country. I’d be suspicious of a ruling class that didn’t dabble in assassination,” Edelgard said.

“I suppose it must be nice for you to have such a commonality with Almyra. I’m glad I finally gave you useful information.” He said it playfully, but it sent a wave of shock to her bones that this boy could joke about such things.

“No government is without such attempts. I do not have to play party to them to succeed,” she said, more to dispel her own fears.

“Well then, have you experienced assassination attempts yourself?” Though he smiled, the corners of his eyes no longer crinkled with humor. “Or was it your family?”

“Neither,” she lied. “I am simply trying to be realistic.”

Though her tone ended the conversation, Claude continued to watch her as she ate, eyes clearly tracking the movement of her hands.

“Any reason you wear gloves to eat?” he asked. “I hate to tell you, but that’s considered poor table manners here.”

“It’s fine. I’m quite practiced with them,” she said.

“So,” he hummed. “I wonder what it is you’re hiding. Tattoos ill befitting of a princess? Or is it scars from nails being punched through your hands.” Claude’s hands moved as he spoke, as expressive as his voice. “Or maybe a mark from a prison, indicating that you aren’t in fact the princess, but indeed a clever imposter?” 

“You have quite an imagination,” Edelgard answered politely.

“I’m just a little curious,” he said. “Honestly, it’s probably just scarring, and no one here is going to see it. No one but me, but we’re going to be best friends for the next few months, right?”

In her irritation, she smeared cheese on her gloves. “…I am not here to make friends. I am here to –“

“Get married and fulfill your family’s wish, I know,” he said. “You don’t want to ruin that pretty surface image and the arrangement along with it. But here’s an honest truth. I’m not going to say anything. The only thing I’m reporting in on is whether you can speak without making a fool of yourself.” Claude gave her a frank look, and it occurred to her he was putting himself out there, in some tiny way. Her teeth ground together, hands hovering just above the table, and he sighed. “Just take off the gloves. You’re barely a princess, here. No more than I am. So why bother with the upkeep? It’s got to be tiring.”

The frustration was doubled by how right he was. Edelgard tapped her fingers on the table. It would benefit her. If he was lying about his reports, it meant another small potential of being sent home. With deft hands, she removed the gloves and placed them on the tray. Claude’s eyes flashed over her hands, but at least he kept his observation short. Scars swirled around her fingers, like unbidden rope had set deep burns into her skin. Her knuckles were pink from the skin she’d torn off against walls and doors, the backs of her hands half branded by the blood transfusions. The rest of her body was no better, and her hands were a blatant key to the trauma that still twisted itself into her. 

Claude said nothing, and she took it as a victory of her own. The two ate the rest of their breakfast in silence and Edelgard found herself enjoying eating for the first time since she had arrived. Though more days passed with traipsing through organization and training, he eventually introduced her to her first proper language session. Claude explained that learning the language was about more than an alphabet. It was about knowing the context, as well. He sat her before a chart of course, but as she began copying letters, he waxed poetic about Almyra’s religious history, its past politics, and the world that gave them the ability to live.

“You did not strike me as a religious person,” she said. Ink stained her fingertips after a day of writing, and she would find it would not wash out for weeks. The gloves that normally adorned her hands had been left in a small compartment next to her bed. “Yet you speak as though it is the bedrock of the land.”

Claude smiled at her. “I’m just giving you the facts. Besides, you don’t have to believe to be grateful.” He held the ruler he had insisted upon using to his bottom lip in thought. “Here’s the thing, princess. I survived by my own strength, till today. I know that as a fact. But I look outside, and I know other people believe in something greater that gives the world life. I’ve seen people pray and give thanks because it’s the right thing to do, when you think you’re taking something someone else made. That… I can believe in people like that. That’s where I stand.”

His words caught like thistle in her heart. Edelgard scoffed. “Certainly, but if there are no gods, people could spend their time better in improving themselves.”

“I can’t say you’re wrong,” he said. “But it seems to me everyone needs their own way of self-improvement.” Claude gestured to her paper. “Yours is repetition.”

“Claude,” she muttered.

“Right, right,” he chuckled. “You’re doing fine. I figure once you’ve written them out enough, that’ll help when you’re starting readings. We’ll start out with a basic text. I’ll read it your language, then Almyran, and then you’ll repeat. We can do that until you’re confident. Unless you want to chat about your religious opinions more.”

“Not particularly,” Edelgard said.

“It’s too bad. I was curious about the difference between the Goddess and those saints in your books.”

She covered her face in her hands and realized too late that the ink was smearing on her cheeks. “I do not think I could bear explaining the nonsense that makes up the Church of Seiros.”

Through increasing lessons, Edelgard finally had a window into Almyra’s history. It gave her no clue as to who she was to marry, as Claude tiptoed around modern leaders and children, but it made it clear to her that the Agarthans had little sway over its history. That knowledge alone was a slight burden off her back considering the way they had worked their way into the very backbone of Fodlan over the millennia. Arriving alive without issue had been only one part of the struggle. Claude and Nader had both been somewhat suspicious, but she knew there was no murderous intent in Nader’s training – only curiosity. Claude had yet to fully absolve himself of suspicion, but every day they ate together, they ate from the same tray. He made the first move as if he could see straight through her. As the days passed without attempts, she felt herself letting her guard down. Each day, Edelgard forced it back up by tightening the sash around her head. He may have convinced her to show one hand, but he could not take everything from her.

History’s reassurance did not assuage all her concerns. The Agarthans could have convinced someone in the present with their power. They were perhaps more influential now than they had been a thousand years ago, and that was so much due to the Insurrection and the fool nobles of her country. That Claude and those above him where hiding her supposed fiancé made her doubt his existence – that, or the masked man was the very killer she had been waiting for.

“You said assassinations are common here, correct?” Edelgard asked one day during a break from their tutoring.

“Wow,” Claude said. “That’s something to remember out of nowhere.”

“I understand it may seem strange to ask, but I thought it important,” she answered.

“You’re worried for your life, aren’t you,” he said.

“No,” she said.

But he was already shaking his head. “Princess, that’s been obvious from the day we met. You walked out of your carriage with an ax in hand. You wait to eat and drink until after I do. You spend most of our time together waiting for the other shoe to drop. I know the behavior.”

“You can’t mean to act as though you’ve experienced an attempt,” she asked incredulously.

“Yes.” His tone was short. “Several. You have the same habits I learned to hide.”

There was little Edelgard could think to say to that. For that, she said the most foolish thing. “Why would someone want to kill a child like you?”

“The same reason someone might want to kill you, princess.” He gave a slight bow. “Anyone with the slightest connection to Fodlan is a scheming coward. A weakling. Someone who needs to be purged from the country. Though you may think it’s such a wonderful thing that I stand here to teach you a language, it’s just one part of the laundry list of issues that keep me locked in this palace. While I certainly pity your situation, know that my kindness is out of survival as much as anything else.”

Respect dawned on her as Claude stopped himself, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “You don’t need to pity me,” Edelgard said. “I’d prefer you not.” Though that was not the reason she feared assassination, it did tell her something of why her uncle had her sent to Almyra. While she did not know who, it would be easy for the Empire to make an excuse about why she would be inevitably murdered. She said, “It’s rather impressive that you survived. I know adult men who have fallen to such attempts.”

Her words seemed to make him smile. “I know a little something or two about poison. Mostly out of necessity, but it’s been useful in maintaining this little thing called living. If you’d like, I could add that to the training regimen here.”

“No, I already have some background with it,” she said with a wave of her hand. “Back home I had a…” Edelgard paused. It was difficult to classify Hubert. Calling him a friend diminutive to the kind of relationship they’d had, but to refer to him as a vassal seemed cold. “Someone important to me who knew many things about poisons.”

“Ah, a boyfriend?” Claude asked, wiggling his eyebrows.

She rolled her eyes. “He had no such interest in me. One could say … we were the closest thing either of us had to a family. I doubt he’d look well upon me calling him family, but this far away, that’s the only thing that could fit.” She chewed on the inside of her mouth. “Regardless, he made sure to outfit me with information about poisons before I left.”

“That’s some good foresight. After all, the thing that makes a poison so deadly is less about whether it has an antidote or not. What’s deadly is when you can’t figure out what it is.” He gives a smile, something of a grim expression with his words. “The thing that kills most people is running out of time.” 

Though his words came like an arrow through her ribcage, Edelgard found herself with more time than she knew what to do with. No one spoke of her marriage unless she questioned its absence. Claude himself seemed almost spiteful of the idea. When she asked, he simply said, “Why would anyone agree to marry a fifteen year old kid? Oh, sorry, you’re sixteen now, aren’t you.” The fact that she was a month older than him seemed to make little difference. 

His frank honesty that had begun to come out from behind the playful deception had become strangely pleasant. Though she meant each day to gain more information, Edelgard slept every night with the sense that she’d accomplished something. Her accent had to be improved, but that was something time would offer. Her writing was abysmal, but it wasn’t like anyone would be concerned in the long run. More than that, she could hear and understand what people were saying. She could take books from Claude, flipping their usual relationship, and almost piece together the contents. It wasn’t the victory she intended to make, and it felt as though it was unworking her true intent, the ambition hammered into her by the experiments, but she could not deny the truth.

It felt good to learn Almyran.

“What do people in Fodlan say about Almyra?” Claude asked one day, in the midst of mutual reading.

She peered up from her book – one on Almyran political history, dense and hard to fully understand even with Claude nearby to help her puzzle out the context and grammar. “Where did that come from?”

“You know most people here don’t think well of Fodlan,” he said. “Nader thinks most are cowards. I can think of two people from there he’s spoken well of, and one of those is that guy he refers to as _the general_. But …” Claude leaned back against the window sill. “Sometimes I wonder how different it is over there.”

“Almyrans are not seen as cowards,” Edelgard started, choosing her words carefully. “But it is no more positive than the Almyran perception of Fodlan. Someone from the Alliance could likely tell you better, but Adrestia has fought most of its wars with another country called Brigid.” Her mouth felt dry. “In the 700s, Dagda and Brigid worked together against Adrestia. The Empire eventually defeated them and took Brigid as a satellite country. Though they have attempted to break free over the years, the most recent attempt ended in the deaths of their rising leaders. I understand the crown princess was taken as a political prisoner. Over the years, Brigid has been widely used by the Empire for importing rare goods, and.” She trailed off. That was her father. Her father’s legacy was the continued colonization of Brigid and that was just another thing she had to return to change. Something in her always questioned it if had to be her, but she shut it down. As the only living child of the Empire – if she didn’t do something, she would be the same as the rest. Edelgard realized how long she’d been quiet and rushed her next words. “I realize that seems off topic, but I feel the way Brigid is seen is likely just the same as Almyra. The only difference is Almyra has not lost.”

“Is that a good thing?” he asked.

Edelgard opened her mouth to speak and stopped in the next. She looked at the book she had been reading. She settled on saying, “Most would say it is.”

“I love Almyra,” Claude said. “I always will. No matter how bad some things are. But I’ll never really know how to change things if I stay here my whole life. Like a bird in a cage.”

“You could run,” she said. “You have some freedom. I am sure they can find another translator. Your skill in both languages would make you valuable to many people.”

“Ah, princess, but that’s where you’ve got me wrong.” Claude gave her a wink. “I’m not doing this to be valuable to anyone. I can’t get ahead in the world if I’m only another pretty belonging to an Alliance noble, either.”

She huffed. “Fine. You are not wrong. But what is so wrong with Almyra? There does not appear to be particular economic strife. There is little magic, and for that, less stratification between classes.” And there were no crests, she thought, and with no crests, that was the greatest victory they never had to fight for.

“Almyra fights the Leicester Alliance often, right?”

“…you know its name?” she asked.

“I know a lot of things, princess. But I’m right on that. We’ve got soldiers who go over to the fortress at the border and fight to an inch of their life. For what? We have land. We’re not a peninsula nation. We have boats and money and space.” Claude stood up, pacing the room. He flicked a finger at Edelgard. “So why are those guys fighting?” 

Soldiers in the Empire fought because their leaders told them to. Other wars came because they wanted to secede, but that meant fighting against the leader rather than another country. Edelgard’s country fought Brigid because of desired resources. So she said, “Is there some resource they’re fighting for?”

“You could call it that,” he said. “Not such a physical concept, though.”

There were revolutions to be fought, and that was a good reason to fight. Yet the two countries held little sway over one another on the political or geological scale.

Claude smiled grimly at her silence. “They’re fighting to gain a name.”

“What?”

“It’s a right of passage,” he said. “Those constant wars at the border? That’s hardly anything to people further east. It’s a matter of young soldiers who come to the border because they know they’ll face a fight and they want to make a name for themselves as proper warriors. That’s where some orphans come from, but the biggest issue is when the Alliance pushes back into Almyran territory. Civilian villages get caught up in the storm. That’s not the kind of thing prideful young men think about, so it keeps happening. Best part is, it isn’t like we know about it here in the capital until after their lines have been broken and they come back home bloodied.” Claude sat on the floor in front of her. “And how do you fix a problem like that?”

“I cannot profess to know,” she answered.

“Because it’s not a problem you face over in Fodlan, right? War is everywhere, but there are different reasons to it, no matter where you go. Those reasons have to be centered in the country’s political and social history.”

“I cannot say you are wrong, certainly, but unless you go to the extent of researching the subject, I doubt you could say for sure.” She slid the Almyran book over to him. “War in my country is an inevitability formed from class stratification and abuses of power from those above. I doubt you could trace a single internal Fodlan war that was not sourced in that.”

“Exactly, princess!” Claude clapped his hands together. “I’m sure I could find wars here that had similar sources, but over the last century, most of our soldiers have been focused on Fodlan, instead. Most of our internal conflicts have been settled by our generals, because they’ve not been fighting each other, because their forces have been so wrapped up with the Alliance! So what if war didn’t have to be an inevitability of power, and instead, there was a council of negotiation between not only countries, but internal states like in Fodlan?”

“That wouldn’t work,” she said.

“Because you aren’t Almyran. I’m saying this as someone who has seen war my entire life. No matter what people here do, as long as you survive it, they start to respect you. So I’m serious. I think that bridging the line between the two countries could be the thing that can start to change the war game.”

Edelgard’s head pounded. She could say a thousand things to fight, but it would play too much of her hand, too many things she needed to hide. Instead, she said, “I see why Nader calls you a soft-hearted fool.”

“Come on,” he said, bouncing to his feet, energy flowing out his body with every small bounce off his toes. “Think about it, Edelgard! You’re smart, and you’ve seen this place, how much potential there is in the people here!”

“Fine,” she muttered. “Then I will speak hypothetically. Let us say you gain political traction in your ideas and are able to sway kings or generals in your favor. Let us say that your attempt to do so does not cause an internal civil war. And then let us say that a full party agrees to go across the border to meet and discuss the issue with Alliance and then broader Fodlan governments. How can you be sure that the attempt to bridge that gap will not throw Almyra into a worse war with the entire country instead? Can you be sure that Almyra’s attempt to understand Fodlan will be met with a similar open-mindedness, instead of further prejudice?”

“I can’t be sure. If I’m being honest, it isn’t an issue I would push out of nowhere, either. It’d have to be the right time and the right place, and maybe that won’t happen in my life time,” he said. “But I know it’s worth a try, because I’m Almyran,” and he said it grinning, but she could see the nervous shake in his shoulders, “And I’ve got Alliance blood.”

Just saying those words seemed to drain him of the limitless excitement and energy that had carried him before, and Claude let out a shaky breath before sitting back down on the ground before Edelgard. He twined his fingers together in front of his face, staring up at her like waiting for some kind of judgment – some kind of retaliation. In his eyes, she saw a child, desperate and hopeful and willing to fight to the ends of the earth to fix every terrible thing the world had spat at him.

Edelgard’s ribcage could crumple under the weight of how much he reminded her of herself in that moment.

It wasn’t the same, she told herself, but just him – Claude, as the person he was, the person he was born as, and the person that had caused him to grow to be, came in the aftermath of those words. Like facts falling into place, the way he said it, as though it meant the world to him. As though he loved the idea of both places, despite what they were in reality.

There were a million things she could say. A million Edelgard could think to ask. Whether everyone outside knew that, whether Nader did, whether it mattered. If that was the reason he knew both languages. If that was the reason he knew poisons so well, if that was the reason he’d faced death, if that was the reason he was so desperate to fight. His comments about the perception of Fodlan and how intimately familiar he could be with the way they were seen, and the question of whether he’d ever step foot in Fodlan for the way he could be treated. Where his parents were. If, if, if, a trillion possibilities, and she hated how much she cared for other people. Bernadetta and Lysithea whose face she’d never seen in person and how she regretted that and now.

And now.

For all of the questions she could ask, Edelgard could only think of what she had lost.

“Do you have any siblings,” she asked, quiet.

“Nah,” he said.

“It must have been lonely,” she said.

He rasped a quiet laugh. “Oh, princess, you do not know the half of it.”

Edelgard dragged her teeth over her lip and nodded. “I must say. It’s hard to debate against you when you close so decisively, Claude.”

A smile began to light his face again and while she could not cry, it made her feel she could, in such the way she felt when thinking of Bernadetta’s words. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about this.”

“I will concede that. Yes. Given a government that gave you an ear and agreed with you. That certainly.” At that, she smiled back at him. “If anyone could perhaps bridge the gap, it might be you. Though I will say, you would still have a massive battle cut out for you, in that very slight chance you managed it.”

“Come on, you know me. I’m nothing if not hard working,” he said, giving her a shitty little bow from his cross-legged position on the floor.

“If it benefits you, certainly,” Edelgard said.

Something strange happened to her chest. It hurt, rib deep, pressure in her throat until – she was laughing. Edelgard found herself laughing, and rose a hand to her mouth like she could cover it up and stop it from escaping her lungs. Tears burned and escaped better than they could in the thousand days she spent in despair prior to arriving here, and she thought it strange when it had been so long since she had truly cried.

Despite her sudden unbidden laughter, Claude did not join her. “You okay, princess?” It was worry creased on his face, and it only made her laugh harder, to see that maybe he cared, too. “Let me get you some water, you look like you’re about to hyperventilate.”

As he left the room, she fell into her bed, hiccupping between laughter and tears. Her arms splayed out across and it was a strange peace. Emptiness was not something Edelgard normally considered a blessing, but here, devoid of energy and laughter carrying away her thoughts – she felt it could have been called happiness.

Days fell in and out like rain water that did not come to the savanna region and Edelgard began to lose track of how long she had spent in Almyra. While she could now pull back a bowstring near as far as Nader, her aim left much to be desired. She never grew much closer to defeating him in their little spars, but each time, she felt more confident about throwing another blow. Evenings and rest days were all Claude, teaching her how to read and write in return for more Fodlan stories. The schedule was distant from her life in the Empire, and it occurred to Edelgard the last thing that had made her feel this way was when she was travelling with her handlers – when she had been content.

It was a strange thing, to call yet another transient fact happiness, but she resolved not to take it for granted.

“I think you’re ready,” Claude said after something close to a year.

“For what?” she asked.

“The queen’s asking for you,” he said.

For the meeting, she wore her best dress. When Claude walked in to see her elegant posture, he shook his head, and pulled out another outfit he brought. It was similar to the kind he had been wearing, but the fabric felt incredible against her skin. The pants did not stick to her skin, loose enough that they caught wind and little else. Unlike the short sleeved top he wore, he made sure to find her a simple white top with sleeves. Edelgard tied a small ribbon around her neck to hide the rest of her skin, and he helped pin a larger crimson sash around her waist.

“The queen is a pretty particular person,” Claude said. “But I doubt she could dislike you.”

The two of them walked together through the halls, arm-in-arm as she finally accepted him as an escort. Though he was little more than a royal translator, she’d grown to respect him over the last months. They’d each experienced turning a year older together, and she had watched him slowly begin to outgrow her, despite being hardly a month apart in age. Though her skill reading was far better than her hearing comprehension, even the idle chatter in the palace had become somewhat familiar to her. Months were not enough to master a language, but Claude’s constant challenging had proven successful. Edelgard hated losing, and for that, he made perfect competition.

“You’ll go in by yourself,” he counseled in a low voice. “Don’t get intimidated. The only people who should have any reason to fear her are enemies, her husband, and her own kid.”

She steeled herself. Enemies – but she could become the person to kill the crown prince. Edelgard said, “Of course.”

Instead of any kind of throne room, Claude led her to a room on the second floor. He opened the door and nodded for her to enter. The room itself had wide open windows, well-lit from the sun outside. A breeze took well through the room, filled with smaller plants she noted were familiar. A woman stood by the window, tanned skin and brown hair tickling her shoulders. She turned her head at the sound of the door closing and Edelgard noted her vibrant green eyes.

“Your highness,” she said, in Almyran.

“I am pleased to finally meet the little ax princess. Nader spoke well of you. Good word from him is hard to win,” the queen answered in turn.

Though Edelgard had to run the words through her head twice to fully understand, she recognized the queen was speaking slowly – likely for her sake. “I thank you. I am appreciative of your housing me for this period,” she answered. The words came out stilted and Edelgard felt embarrassed for her poor speaking.

Despite that, the queen nodded. “I see the boy has taught you well.”

“He is,” Edelgard started, and then paused, not sure how to find the words. In her own language, she muttered, “He’s secretive to a fault and delights in my consternation, but …” Switching back to Almyran, she said, “He is very kind and smart. I was appreciative of his goodness.”

The queen laughed. “You’re not wrong.” Edelgard was taken aback as the queen spoke the language of Fodlan. “You could say his greatest flaw is how much of a smartass he is.” Though there was an accent at first, it disappeared with each subsequent word, until she sounded as native as Edelgard was.

Another glance around the room, and Edelgard realized why the flora was so familiar. “These are Fodlan flowers,” she said.

“They’re from the Alliance,” the queen said. “I made sure to bring a few before I left.”

Edelgard stared, fear beginning to set into her bones. Someone from the Alliance could have connections with the people who hurt her. They could report her back. They could know her uncle. This woman could have connections and Edelgard had never once heard of her in her life, let alone the time she spent in the palace.

As though noticing her silence or her fright, the queen said, “I left the Alliance almost two decades ago now. I have no warm heart for Fodlan. If you are concerned I had something to do with this marriage agreement, I promise you I did not.”

“Then why did you want to meet me,” Edelgard whispered. If the queen did not have a hand in it, it could have been the king instead. Or maybe even whatever prince it had instead. 

“I wanted to be sure I was not allowing the marriage of an unprepared child,” she said with a sigh. “I understand you are sixteen. Some would say that is old enough to marry and bear children, but I disagree. In a country where people have the space to grow old, a child should not have to marry. I will not be letting you go to marriage, yet. And even once you do, you will be held to no expectations.” She paused. “But I will allow you to meet your fiancé. I wanted to inform you we’ve arranged a proper meeting for tomorrow. As you have begun to understand the language and customs, you should be able to at least understand what people are saying about you.” The queen smiled, tight and bitter. “I don’t want someone to go through the same struggle my husband and I did when we first married.”

“Did your family –“ Edelgard began to ask, but the queen cut her off.

“I ran away from home to marry. Like a love-struck fool. We felt it was worth any struggle, but looking back, I don’t want the same to be pushed onto a child forced to come here by family.”

“Thank you, then,” Edelgard said, flipping back to Almyran. “Is there anything else, your highness?”

“No,” the queen said, returning as well. “You may go, ax princess.”

Edelgard excused herself and opened the door. As she did, a weight came against it and Claude fell through, landing on the ground.

“Boy,” rang out behind them, and Edelgard spun around to see the queen closing in. She spoke faster and louder and it quickly became impossible for Edelgard to understand her fast spray of Almyran at Claude. All she could tell was the meek look on his face meant nothing good for him.

“Could I at least return the princess before you punish me?” he asked, head tilted down in feigned penitence, but staring up at the queen.

The queen held poised fingers to her forehead, sighing before she gave a terse wave of her hand to dismiss them both.

“Great,” Claude said and leapt from the ground. He grabbed Edelgard’s hand without hesitance and pulled her into the hall, the two going from a brisk walk to a run up the stairs.

“What are you doing,” she half-yelled.

“Making as much distance between me and her inevitable explosion as possible,” he called back.

Together, the two of them ran up every flight of stairs, until they reached what Edelgard had assumed was the top floor. Claude gestured to her to lean over and opened a small door that led through a short hall and a tight corridor of stairs. Once she climbed in, he closed the door behind her. He wiggled past her to begin climbing up. The walls caught at the loose fabric of her clothes and the scarf she wore over her hair. But eventually, they reached the top and Claude offered a hand to pull her into the dusty room.

“She’ll forget about all that eventually,” he said. “Whenever she catches onto my schemes, I just come up here to wait it out.”

“So this happens frequently,” Edelgard said.

“If no one told you anything, I’m sure you’d resort to eavesdropping, too,” Claude said. She huffed a quiet laugh and he poked her cheek. “See, it even made you laugh. That’s such an achievement they should give me an award.”

“Don’t push your luck,” she said, pushing him back with a gentle shove. “The next thing you know, you’ll be getting accolades at your funeral.”

“I don’t plan on dying anytime soon, princess. So you don’t need to worry about me.”

It had become difficult not to smile at least a little more genuinely around Claude. “I’m not. But I can provide advice where I see it is needed.”

“Why, thank you, your majesty,” he said with a sarcastic bow. “When I take over the country, I must have you at my side as advisor.”

“I see,” Edelgard said. “So that’s why Nader mentioned you cared so much. You’re planning a revolution against the royal class? I’m impressed, Claude.”

“Who said it has to be a revolution,” he said with a grin. 

“Once I’m done relieving myself of the marriage issue, I suppose I could always offer you a little aid,” she said, stretching her arms out.

“You’re too kind,” he said.

“What is this room?” she asked, beginning to look around. “Is this an attic, or something of a safe room for royals.” She moved aside some broken lumber and peered out a window. A gently sloping roof was just outside, but below that, the ground stood a dizzying distance away.

Behind her, Claude pinched a strand of hair off the back of her neck. “Your scarf is falling off.”

She jolted back inside, hitting the back of her head against the window. Though it hurt, her hands flew to the scarf and how loose her hair hung. Edelgard pulled it off, but the pain from hitting her head rang in her hands such that they shook too much to braid the hair back into formation.

“You need help over there?” Claude asked. When she glanced over, Edelgard saw he was looking away. “I won’t look unless you ask me to.”

“Why,” she asked. Cold and nervous. She was used to him being the kind of person who would cling to any clue he could find. The fact that he wasn’t now seemed strange. “What does it matter if you see.”

“Because you’ve chosen to hide it this entire time. I didn’t know why, but if it’s come undone and you didn’t want it to, I figure it would be in poor taste for me to start staring now,” he said.

Edelgard sat down and stared at her shaking hands. “You can look,” she finally conceded. “But only if you help me tie it back up.”

If Claude was shocked by her white hair, he made no show of it on his face. For once, he was wholly serious. Kneeling in front of her, he asked, “How do you tie it up?”

“Braid it and wrap the braid around the top of my head. Once you do that, use this metal piece to pin the scarf and wrap that the rest of the way. …I’m sure you’ve noticed how I do it.”

“Yeah,” he admitted.

As Claude started to work, he brushed his fingers through her hair to straighten it out from the tangles that had begun to form. He was brisk and gentle and Edelgard said, “You already knew.”

Rather than asking what she meant, Claude said, “It was hard not to notice.” He separated her hair out and began to braid, tight and practiced. “You usually keep your eyebrows covered too, but sometimes the scarf slipped up. Most people don’t have white eyebrows. It’s slipped out when you’ve trained with Nader, too, but he’s not the sort of person to care about that if you can prove yourself.”

“But you are,” she said.

Claude gave a heavy sigh. “Yes, yes, and yes, princess.”

“Then you’re going to want to know why,” she said quietly.

He pulled her hair up and around, fingers brushing past the edge of her ears, and held the braid to the top of her head. Edelgard could feel his breath against her skin as he leaned closer to her back. She saw him lift the scarf up and felt its cool fabric as he wound it around her head and finally pinned it at the top.

“You see right through me, princess,” he whispered. “But there’s one thing you’re wrong about.”

“And what’s that?” she said, staring straight ahead.

Claude’s hands lingered a moment longer on her head. “I’m not the kind of person to dig into open wounds.” With that, he let go, and walked to the window she had been staring through. Silence settled in between them, but while it was awkward, it was not uncomfortable.

She gingerly pressed her fingers into the scarf and its twists and folds, finding it sturdier when fixed by someone else. “Thank you,” she said.

“I’m not sure what this room is,” Claude said, as though skipping back and away from what happened. “It’s something of a forgotten room. As a kid, I spent a lot of time exploring. Not a lot of other kids my age around here, you know.” She walked over and he pointed out the distant buildings below. “We’ve taken in more orphans lately, but it’s sort of a … too little, too late situation. It’s all younger kids. I’m glad we’re doing it, but every time I see them…” Edelgard watched the crinkle of his brow darken his face, the frown twisting his typical play of distance. He pulled his head back inside with more grace than her and finally said, “Every time I see them, I just think we could have done more sooner. Nader always says I’m just being a soft hearted child, but you’ve seen this place. It’s beautiful. We want for nothing by terms of physical need. But there’s always going to be something more to improve.”

When he slinked down against the wall, Edelgard sat beside him, shoulders touching. In the sun, dust danced around the room like gold and landed in his warm brown hair. 

“In my homeland, there are problems like that, too,” she whispered, quiet enough to be the breeze. As though her uncle could be listening in when she is countries away, in the hidden peak of another country’s capital. “Nobility chokes out the common people and gives them no way to succeed or improve their situation. Ruling cowards force trauma on their children to shape them into monsters like them. I had been waiting already … too long to become the emperor, because I thought I could change something. But in a moment, it was stolen from me. …In that way, I understand.”

“Nice to know I’m not the only person who notices,” he answered. “Sorry that you got stolen out of your home, I guess, but. It’s not all bad.” When she turned her head, Claude was looking straight at her, smiling just enough that his eyes crinkled and sent light spinning through his bright green eyes. “We wouldn’t have met otherwise.”

It sent a note of elation through her head, at the same time as a strange sense of déjà vu, making Edelgard dizzy and unsure. “I suppose so…” Staring at his green eyes. Their fingers were touching, almost entwined.

He laughed, warm and quiet. “Did you notice something interesting, princess?”

His green eyes were unlike anyone else’s she had seen in Almyra.

Everyone except the queen.

The smile on her face froze and melted. “You’re afraid of the queen,” she said.

“Yeah?” Claude answered.

“No one but … the king and her son should be scared of her,” Edelgard muttered. She pulled her hands into her lap, away from him. “That’s what you told me.”

He was nothing if not smart. Though Claude could tiptoe around the obvious, he responded to the unspoken. “I wasn’t lying,” he said. “I did tell you I have a parent from Almyra and a parent from Fodlan.”

“A lie doesn’t have to be something you say,” she spat. Edelgard was on her feet and she did not know when she had stood up, but there was a small fire of anger growing in her chest, and despite how furious she could feel herself becoming, she could not allow it to grow out of control. “Goodbye.”

“Edelgard,” he said. That, stupidly, made her stop and she hated herself for it. “I’m barely treated like a prince in the first place. I just.” When he stopped talking, Edelgard glanced back and saw him running both his hands through his hair, frustrated. Claude went on, “I dislike people drawing conclusions based on who my family is over who I am. That’s been my entire life. …If you hate me for this, I can’t change your mind. But I’d rather you hate me for who I am than who you assume me to be.”

She stared, one foot toward the door, one toward Claude. “I do not hate you,” she murmured. The crash of reality was simply too much for her to simply accept. Fire rose and fell in her chest with each breath, threatening to overwhelm her, and she was not sure if it was her mind betraying her or the crests within her going wild. Edelgard flipped over to Almyran and the words came out easier when coming from a different internal map. “I am sure I will see you again tomorrow.”

At that, she moved to leave, only catching his last words – “Plan on it, princess.”

Her dinner was brought to her room without a sign of Claude, but the rest of the night, she heard frantic footsteps outside her door, and a phrase repeated so often she finally recognized it for what it was. “The prince,” workers and nobles alike said, “Where is he?”

Edelgard could barely eat and she could not sleep through the echo of voices in her head. The prince was missing – the prince was causing trouble – the prince was always doing something, and the prince was Claude. It had always been Claude.

She had been waiting for so long to meet her betrothed, and there he was, teaching her the entire time. Edelgard had been waiting to meet the man she planned to kill, and he was a child like herself, lonely and filled with intent and dreams and revolution. She realized when he spoke of his reign, it was not a joke. It was a promise.

“I have to,” she whispered to herself. The fire burning in her chest was not true anger. It was fear. A sick cowardice she could not rid herself of. “If I do not, Adrestia will fall to ash. I have to. I need to. I have no choice.” It was a mantra that took her, until she could no longer speak from fatigue and the words lulled her to a quiet sleep.

To go home, she would need to kill the crown prince of Almyra.

He had no brothers or sisters.

Claude had to die.

When she woke the next morning, it was to a knock at her door. She could not lie to herself and say it was anything but fear that stopped her from moving to answer it. Yet, when Edelgard opened it, it was not Claude. A servant offered a dress to her, one of the many her uncle had left with her. The sight of it left a bitter taste in her mouth.

“Thank you,” she said.

The servant came in to help her dress. In the inner pockets, she would store the poison vials. If Hubert had known she’d have to poison someone who was so much of a poison aficionado, she wondered what he would recommend. If Claude would know what was happening to him before he died. The thought was like lead in her marrow. They helped her with the final button and let her stand before the mirror.

“Your hair?” they asked.

“Leave it,” she said. Edelgard had not undone it since Claude had put it back up. His handiwork had held firm through her restless night of sleep. It was the least she could do.

The servant led her from her room, down the stairs, to something of an announcement hall. Edelgard was directed to sit at the end table. It was likely the first time the announcement was being made publically, she realized. When Edelgard had come to Almyra, no one had given her much of a glance, and she had been kept wholly inside the palace since her arrival. No one knew their prince was being married to another Fodlan citizen. Knowing that complicated the issue further. If she had known from the start it was Claude she was meant to marry, she could have taken care of the issue before a public announcement was made. Edelgard quieted the voice in her head that said – it would have been easier if you did this before you cared so much.

People filed into the sides of the hall, and she recognized some of them. Certain servants, Nader, the queen, and finally – she saw Claude, decked out in royal regalia and brilliant gold. It fit him well, making his eyes stand out even from so far away. Edelgard made herself look away. 

Someone stepped up to the end of the hall, close to her table. She could not see their face, but they were broad-framed and strong. Eventually, Edelgard concluded it had to be the king. His voice rang out across the hall.

“We of Almyra do not give our children away freely. We spend time to sharpen their wit and their blades before we allow them to make their mark on the world. Fodlan has been an enemy for many years, but we are now changing that!” He clapped the end of a spear on the ground. “No simple lady of the land could be accepted, but today, we invite a new daughter into our ranks. She has been tested by our greatest warriors and been found fitting to our name. Today, I allow a prince of our realm to step forward into adulthood, and announce their marriage.”

Over the applause, she could not hear the king’s words well. Edelgard saw the doors at the end of the hall open one final time and watched a man walk down the center of the hall, to come to a halt at her table. She found herself staring and forced a slight smile onto her face.

“Greetings,” she said in Almyran.

“To you as well, my princess,” the man said, and her heart began to sink.

“Ejder Mirza, meet your bride,” the king announced.

The room around Edelgard melted into nothing, her carefully planned expectations with them. 

“I am pleased to finally meet you, my princess,” he said in Almyran, Claude’s typical endearment twisted by the possessive. “The day of our marriage cannot come sooner.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Man why's Claude being so open and nice"   
> me: idk i guess it's easier to be a little more honest when you're talking to a rando who has no influence over your future and also you aren't sticking your neck out every moment you risk someone in the alliance finding out you're half almyran. big intent?
> 
> anyway im gay for these two as ever. augh. you kids make me wanna cry.


	3. you can lead a horse to water but it won't drown itself

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Edelgard makes a choice.

The room to which Edelgard’s fiancé invited her was several steps larger than her own. The ceiling reached higher, alongside carpeting that made her sink with each move she made. As she stared at him, she struggled to remember his name as he had told it to her, but the memory bubbled into air each time she tried to grasp it. Confidence held strong, she walked over to his beckoning hands, the surroundings melting into darkness around her. She kept eyes on him alone. Ejder’s immaculate beard, any softness in his face cut away by the sharp fashion of the hair that framed his face, to the rich and bright clothing, using rich violet and gold adornment to bring it color. Everything about him spoke of wealth and everything else spoke of want.

When Edelgard sat beside him, she realized it was a bed the two sat on. Cream covers the shape of darkness under his eyes, giving a semblance of youth, and she wondered how much older he was than her, or Claude, or anyone else. Not terribly so, but the thought was another quiet condemnation in her mind. Another quiet acceptance. Though there were hands on her, she could not feel them. The thought of poison in her skirts kept her present above all else. Poison and the quiet sense of freedom it could bring, the power to stand over what her uncle continued to chain her to and laugh in its face.

The poison came in wine she poured for the two of them. She took careful sips, always cognizant of the light and pain that would pound behind her eyes if she attempted to drink too much. As they laid down in the bed, Edelgard waited for the poisons to take him without comment. The scars that wound around her body like rope and grotesque rat tails made him no less likely to touch her. With her eyes closed, she was a thousand miles away, and it was easy to disappear when there was no considerable pain, no magician standing over her and demanding her pain and attention. Her agony was not required here to determine she was still alive.

“Princess,” came as a quiet whisper to her ear.

Edelgard’s heart raced in her chest with a quiet horror and miserable hope. As she opened her eyes –

She opened her eyes to the body that laid next to her.

She wore the cotton clothes from Ordelia, soft and sweet in their scent of willow and orchid.

Green eyes met hers. Lifeless and distant. The ceiling stretched into infinity. Bars rose up to shadow her in cold nothing, and it was not cotton she wore, but her royal attire worn to rags, the scent of blood, the scent of death, the scent of rotten flesh, and her arms were bleeding, her knuckles raw, and it was her voice.

Her voice, screaming, in another life, in another memory, now, hands holding her still and forcing her to stare at what she had done, forcing her to stare at Claude’s dying form, and it was her fault, it was her plan, it was her ambition, because she lived.

The floor fell out from under her and Edelgard opened her eyes once again to the dark ceiling of her room, sheet wrapped around her arms like chains. Her throat was dry and worn, but no one came running to check or stare in voyeuristic curiosity. She dragged herself up to a sitting position and leaned against the bed. It had been a week since Edelgard had met her fiancé. A week of nightmares had come to bear with him, as though paying her back for the nights of rest she’d dared to steal over the last months.

She and Ejder had met over lunch and short tea breaks for light discussion of her life in the Empire and longer discussions of his home in the east. He very much liked to talk about himself and she could not profess to understand everything he said, but the benefit of a person like this was simple. They didn’t care much what she did. It was similar to nobles like Vestra. Everything was about power and never about her. She was a girl and nothing else. It was strange to think that he would speak so freely if he intended to kill her, but as time went on, Edelgard realized how little she cared about an assassin any longer. Perhaps there had never been one. Perhaps this had been precisely what her uncle intended for her, to sit and listen to the ramblings of a man who agreed to marriage for a dowry and little else.

If she were not so ambitious, it would not be the worst life a person could live. Ejder was friendly and quick to offer something to drink, interested in making her laugh or smile with his stories. She would not be his first wife and it was unlikely she would be his last, but that wasn’t unheard of or atypical in royalty. Her own mother had been a queen-consort. He seemed to genuinely love his home and that was something Edelgard could not begrudge a person. More than anything, he had not once laid a hand on her. Regardless, Edelgard’s dreams enjoyed crossing boundaries to torture her each night and leave their marks on her during the day. It made her feel no better to attend their planned lunch dates. Fortune and practice were her lone companions in hiding nervous twitches as shy distance.

For the time she spent with Ejder, however, she was spending no less time learning with Claude. With the arrival of the true promise of marriage came new and more inconvenient information to learn. Now came the issue of using the language to understand law and order, to see into tax codes and market management. Though she did not dread it, having to learn it in a new language was no inconsiderable feat. Claude insisted, however, as satellite wives who stayed in their husband’s territory would often be the ones to manage such affairs.

“If you can’t figure it out, I’m sure no one else could have a hope of doing so,” he would say with a broad and self-assured grin. 

“I must admit,” she started. “I am not wholly familiar with this aspect of governance.” Taxation was handled by counties across Adrestia, typically by the leading noble of the region, and that would be dispensed to the necessary accounts for local militia and other county specific funds. “While counts are supposed to ensure a certain percentage of collected funds reaches the capitol, that was usually to be invested in Enbarr itself or placed into a treasury in case of a national emergency or war. Most affairs were handled locally with some negotiation between the land-owning nobles borders.” Without oversight or thought, but she held back from saying what she truly thought.

Claude rolled his head around as though he was savoring the words before he said, “I forgot, your emperor is more of a figure-head, right?” She bit her tongue and nodded. The insurrection had only solidified the nobles' power. “I guess I can see how that differentiates it. Something like an oligarchy? But set up as though they’re smaller countries within the overall country… if I had to ask anything, I’d ask you if you thought that worked, but the look on your face tells me otherwise.”

She evened out the crease in her brow and gave him a smooth smile. “I am the daughter of the emperor. I have my own opinions, but of course, that doesn’t mean much in another country.”

“I’d say it means an awful lot,” he answered. “I mean. I can’t get you to talk that much about most things.” Claude reflected her smile, easy and frustrating.

“There are many issues with my country’s government,” Edelgard said, stiff. “That is no different than other countries. Be it assassination or social issues. If you have put so much thought into your country at such a young age, why would I have not done the same?”

“Always giving those boring answers, princess,” he sighed. “I wanna know what you seriously think. Come on, like, your generals are the same people as the nobility that runs the land, right? And then here, we’ve got military equivalent, but they don’t run land issues, they have a council up here in the city where they argue with my mom and dad all day instead. And then everyone who runs the land, they’re all the princes and next-in-lines after me, but some give up their land titles to become generals because it gets them a seat at this table. It’s gotta be weird that your generals get to have their cake and eat it too.”

“Are you asking me because you’re interested in debating?” she asked, somewhat incredulous.

“No,” he said. Then, “Maybe. Hey, it doesn’t have to be a debate. No one said debate.” Despite his words, Claude’s eyes sparkled.

“I suppose those books I brought did not sate your curiosity.” Edelgard feigned weariness, but in her heart, she could not ignore how bemused she felt. The thought of her uncle and the Agarthans weighed less heavy on her like this, and the two spoke until dawn threatened to burn through the curtains and betray them for the sleep they had ignored.

In many ways, Claude’s curiosity for Adrestia and Fodlan as a whole made her look back on her own home in a more positive light. Regaling stories of how countries came together and split apart, discussing how the three parts of Fodlan arranged royalty and military, and his absurd notions of negotiation over war, Edelgard found herself in a long and sound sleep for the first night since she had met her fiancé. The only issue came upon waking up – the only issue came as her thoughts, alone, lingering over their discussions. She and Hubert had planned to execute any nobles who dared to step down and away from their power. It was the best option, the obvious way to begin to dismantle the church and its power, but Claude had picked through her ideas like they were made of cheese cloth.

“If you kill everyone in power, it doesn’t take a loyal soldier to fight against you,” he said. “All it takes is someone scared enough of what you’d do to them.”

Every minor comment she made, feigned to seem in passing, he delighted in tearing apart as though they were log houses constructed from toothpicks and river mud. Every word frustrated her more, but to fight back would be to play too much of a hand. The way he spoke almost made it seem there was a use for nobility, however transient, during any transition of power. As though he had the idea in his head that he could simply use and convince them.

“And how would you push a noble to aid you if you were honest about your want to have them step down,” she asked in an irritated bout.

“Do I have to tell them everything about my plans?” Claude said, more than asking. “Regardless, if I can’t give them convincing evidence that it would be good for them and the people around them, then there is either an issue with me,” he gestured wide and exuberant, “Or there is a severe issue with them, and I would go back later with allies to take care of them long-term.”

“Suppose they gathered allies of their own under the assumption you planned to depose them,” Edelgard said. “Suppose that the people you’re up against are not so humane as to give you the chance to speak.” The memory of the Agarthans made her bones cold and brittle. “What would you do then?”

“Well, I can’t just murder everyone who disagrees with me because it’s easiest.” Claude rolled his eyes. “One, I only have so much poison, and two, it sets a bad precedent. Like, oh no, there’s that murder guy, don’t go to his dinner parties. And then if I joke that my Adrestian Deer Roast is to die for, then everyone runs out of the room screaming.”

“Claude,” she muttered.

“Fine,” he said. “I don’t know, Edelgard. I don’t know everything because I’m not trying to lead anyone yet. But I hope that given enough time, I’d know what to do in that situation. I’ve got time to figure it out. So do you! Like Nader would say, we’re basically just babies swaddled in a crib.” In the night, he had given her a gentle flick on her forehead. “So why not chill about the murder questions.”

Maybe it was because he’d been exposed to so many assassination attempts, or perhaps because his parents had been so tough on him for so long, but Claude had an undeniably unique perspective gilded by concern and defiance. And speaking to him unfortunately had only hammered into her how childish so many of her plans had been. The idea of a post-war economy, the issue of how to maintain her army, the question of whether she could make her people trust her after such deeds. If she managed to win the war. 

If she survived it.

If she had planned to.

There were many terrible questions that Claude had forced her to consider and that was another she had to file away into the abyss of nothing, because it did not matter as long as she was in Almyra. This could wait. Edelgard told herself many things, but even she knew her excuses were running thin. If nothing else, she took some small terrible comfort in the fact that not even he could weasel his way into a plan for dealing with the kind of people who ruined her life.

The two slept through the day to some slight admonishment from vague adult figures in the palace, but his parents and her fiancé did not trouble them for their absenteeism. Claude took their chat as new fuel for a fire and spoke fearlessly, chattering treason and the like that would brand him a heretic if he dared to speak in Fodlan. However, in the boundaries of Edelgard’s room and the table they shared for tea, there was a world held for the two of them to safely inhabit.

"You spend much time with the crown prince?" Edjer asked her, when she finally made up for missing their last tea time.

"Claude?" she asked, still unused to hearing him referred to so formally. "Yes, he's the one who has been teaching me."

Ejder chuckled. "Claude," he repeated, the name drawn out strangely in his tongue. "Is that Fodlan for something?"

"Oh, no. He asked me to call him that," she said. Today, she had the opportunity to brew tea, and she selected the Ordelian version that had been given to their carriage before they'd left. "This drink isn't one from Adrestia, but it is a Fodlan based tea. Somewhat floral, but I hope you enjoy it."

"Thank you, my princess." Ejder took the proferred cup with a warm smile. "The prince is a strange boy. He does not take the honored name of his parents? I am surprised they let him do so much as he pleases."

Edelgard gave a forced polite smile. "I am sure it is something he did to make the transition easier for me."

"Ah, so thoughtful," he said. "This tea is quite good. If everything you brought from Fodlan is so delightful, I am sure you will be popular in my home." Edelgard thanked him, but he went on. "It is a shame that the coward prince is the one who instructed you, but it is better than nothing."

She forced a laugh. "A coward prince? No, I promise you, he is quite brave."

Ejder shook his head sadly. "The boy does not leave the palace. A proper prince should be willing to walk with their troops. His parents have not allowed him to live properly. Still, I will be sure to thank him for teaching you so well. You are entertaining, my princess. I look forward to our next tea."

Though Edelgard left shaky, she said nothing else. It was not so different than the nobles of her land to hear one speak so backhandedly about others, but she'd spent so little time around new people in the time she'd spent in Almyra. A year now, and she cursed herself for allowing her expectations to change. The man wasn't evil. If he were, it would make it easier to poison him, but he wasn't. She had seen far worse from Adrestian nobles. As she watched Claude, however, she realized how cognizant he had to be when Ejder had spoken so freely.

“Today, we’re dancing,” Claude announced, spinning around to her before she had the opportunity to unravel what he had said.

“I know how to dance,” she muttered. Weariness from the previous days clung to her body and she wondered how he could function on so little sleep. Despite all her physical training, mental fatigue set in far too easily and left her in a state of fog.

Claude gave her little opportunity to gather herself and spun a chair in front of her before sitting down. “A proper dance,” he said. “They expect me to teach you and every wedding has dancing. An event is nothing without dancing.”

Try as she might, Edelgard could not disagree with his sentiment. Dancing was a soft light in the fugue of her memory, the process of learning and teaching like a kindness she couldn’t quite place. “Alright. Teach me your dance.” She didn’t intend to let her fiancé live long enough to see their wedding, but it was only because he was so excited to show her. No other reason.

He was up before her and pushing tables out of the way to make space for the two of them to move. “The most important thing about this dance is everyone is there. It’s not much of a dance if it’s just the two of us, but with my finesse, we can make do.”

She sniffed and folded her arms. “Again, you introduce me to something that is not at all uncommon from my country. There are several dances that require large groups to perform effectively.”

“Well, princess, I bet they are nowhere near as fun as what I am about to teach you.” Claude bowed and gestured for her to stand. “I will be honest and tell you that probably anyone could do this, but as we are of such high standing, we wouldn’t want to get beaten out by some random guy with quick feet.”

“So it’s a competition,” she said, enunciating each word.

“Anything is a competition is you want it to be,” he said in a painfully cheery voice. At that, she gave in and stood at attention. Claude took her hand and stood beside her. “So, the basic version of this dance involves everyone making contact. Usually, you’ll have a big chain of people and odds are, a chunk of them will be tipsy.”

“Very good instructions so far,” Edelgard said dryly. 

“Yeah, I know, I’m just so good? I’m sure you’ve already figured it out, but it’s mostly using your legs.” He held up her hand and bounced from one leg to the other, one coming back and then kicked out to a rhythm she imagined existed only in Claude’s head. “So you’ll get all the grammas and kids wrapping their arms around your shoulders or your waist, and then all the really competitive kids just holding hands and doing crazy kicks.” He spun Edelgard around while keeping a rhythm of his own. “Everyone wants to be on the end of the chain though because then they can just spend the whole time showing off how good and cool they are.”

Moving like that made it hard for Edelgard to hold back a hint of laughter and she mimicked the bouncing dance that Claude performed, speeding up as he did when she started catching onto the rhythm. 

“See what I mean,” he laughed. “It’s fun! You’ve got it down.”

“Not much of a lesson,” she said, biting back a smile. “Most of my dance lessons as a child were about form and style.”

“Hey, we’ve got plenty of time for style.” Claude squeezed her hand and let her go free. “That’ll be lessons 5 through 20, and will probably require a down payment.”

“Unfortunately, I believe I am running a little low on books for your reward.”

He put a hand on his chin as though putting immense effort into thinking. “Perhaps instead we could trade … lessons. What is this strange … da-ants you speak of?”

Edelgard rolled her eyes. “If you so want it, I will teach you a basic Adrestian dance.”

“It must be my birthday,” he said. “I get to have two entire dances with the foremost princess of the land.”

“Potentially the last two if you continue like this,” she said, but gave him an obvious smile to offset the words. Edelgard took his left hand in her right and placed the other on his back. “I will lead, if you do not mind.”

“I don’t know what that even means,” he said, bright and airy.

“One party leads in the dance and the other follows the movements. That is not to say the person following has nothing to do, but the movement is guided by a selected lead,” Edelgard explained. She did not tell him it was usually the taller party who played lead in a pair and had him follow her in a simple square, brushing off his sighs of boredom. 

“Your face when you saw your fiancé the other day was priceless,” he said, as though trying to stave off how simple the dance was. “I thought you were so looking forward to meeting the guy. My mom actually gave me an earful because I started laughing about it, though.”

Edelgard frowned. “If you don’t enjoy this, then we can always stop.”

“Oh, I could never leave when the two of us were having so much fun,” he said. Despite that, he kept peering down at her, as though analyzing the small quirks of her face. The more she tried to keep her face still, the more she realized she was giving off. “Oh, no way.” Claude started laughing. “You thought it was going to be me?”

“I will end this session if you need to entertain yourself with hearsay,” she muttered.

“No, no, I’m seriously flattered,” he said, struggling to pull his laughter under control. “But you really did think that, right? That’s why you looked so confused when Ejder was walking over to you.”

“What was I supposed to think,” she grumbled, now grateful for the core work archery had given her. "It was hard to believe that someone who acts as you do could be a prince, but you were the only unmarried royalty I was aware of existing." Claude wasn’t getting any shorter and it took a reasonable amount of strength to balance them both and lead their steps. “As I am a princess, I would expect that I would only be set to an arranged marriage with a prince.”

“Oh, he’s a prince,” he said. “An eastern Almyran prince. You don’t have to be the child of a king to be a prince in every case, dear princess.” He fell silent to the careful beats she made in her head and with her feet, both of them waltzing around the room like they’d been born to do it. His hand on her shoulder tightened, along with the thoughtful look on his face turning sour. 

“There’s no point in you being passive aggressive,” she said, tapping her foot against his to convince him to begin spinning. “Speak your mind.”

“Nah,” he said.

“Says the person who spent an entire night convincing me to open up on my opinions about government. If I say please, would you consider it?”

Claude breathed out his nose, mouth tight. “I’m just letting negativity get the best of me. I don’t want to ruin our lovely lesson here.”

She gave a pronounced sigh and feigned letting go. “How sad. I suppose I should let you go on your lonesome, then?”

“Alright, fine,” he said. “It’s just.” He fell silent again and Edelgard kept up their slow dance, as though movement could work away all the quiet. “It’s not like Almyra would be happy to see their." He stopped again and said a term she'd only heard used in insult. "That kind of prince isn't one that has many fans."

His words made her want to stop their play at learning, but Claude had too tight a grip on her. “…you’re not what they say..” she said.

“And yet, how the public seethes,” he said, leaning such that she had to dip him back. As though he already guessed exactly how this dance would go. “I know it seems like Nader wouldn’t these days, but when I was a kid, everything was much more … trial by fire, shall we say? I’m just one prince. Expendable as the rest.”

“But you’re smart,” she responded. Though Edelgard knew the right words, she fumbled to say them and fumbled her steps, as honesty was still an unfamiliar language to her tongue. “You’re charismatic, you know multiple languages, you are handsome and fair, even with that mouth of yours. You have plans for when you take rule. You have plans to help people and expand what you know.”

“I’m smart because I have to be. If I wasn’t smart, I’d be dead.” Their steps wavered back and forth in a repeatable, obvious pattern. “I’m charismatic because if I didn’t have a way to win the people in this castle over, I’d be dead. I know multiple languages because, surprise, it makes me useful, and less worth killing.” She had never seen him more tired. “Just because it looks like the people in this palace tolerate me doesn’t mean the rest of the city outside does, princess. Like I told you before, there are a lot of reasons I'm stuck in this place. Surviving outside would be more difficult than you know. And frankly? I don’t know if I can.”

“…you must be joking,” she said.

His hold on her softened and the two came to a stop. “I’m not.”

“The great and enviable Claude, taken so low by the views of other people?” Edelgard found herself untangling her hands from him, folding her arms across her chest, and the hollow look on his face made her feel no better about the distance she put up. “I never thought I would see the day. Truly, I thought you were someone great. Even respectable. You cannot mean to tell me that you could allow yourself to be so affected by the views of other people.”

His hands fell to his sides as though weighted down. “Sorry to say it, but you’re right. I am.”

The cold tone in his voice took her out of her blustering notions. “I am … I am sorry, I did not mean –“

“Yeah, I know,” Claude said. “I just thought. Maybe you’d listen. Take me seriously, after how much time we’ve spent together. I thought someone who wanted to run like me might get it.”

“What?”

“Those notes written in your archery book. They weren’t your handwriting.”

A frantic note bit into her voice. “I didn’t say you could look at that one.”

“Call it an honest mistake,” he muttered. “But I know you’ve been wanting to escape. No matter how you dress yourself up in this," and he waved a hand in the air, "imperial flair, you don’t give a damn about what your family wants you to do. You said it yourself. You were planning on becoming their next emperor. You were planning on changing the world. That’s not the talk of someone who has accepted their fate.”

“So I made a mistake,” she said. “A slip of the tongue. You cannot try to put such cowardice as running upon me.”

“What makes it cowardice now?” he asked.

“What do you mean,” she asked in return.

“You said I could run,” he said. “You insisted upon it. Is it anymore cowardice now than it was before? Or has finding out that I’m the crown prince changed your view of me that much.”

Edelgard could not find a response to those words.

“Looks like I finally caught your tongue.” He spoke over her shoulder. “My point is. If you’re looking to run away. You don’t have to do it alone.”

For someone who had spent her life knowing she needed to be alone, his words were borderline insult as much as they were a terrible want crashing in her chest. 

“You disapprove of my spouse to be?” she asked. “You seemed so excited to teach me that dance for the ceremony, I couldn’t have imagined.”

Claude tried to laugh, but it came to her ears as a scoff. “Listen, Edelgard. My parents? Neither of them approved. They got that offer from the Adrestian Empire and declined it. Too many issues between our countries and too much risk in taking on the young daughter of a figurehead emperor. When they heard this guy accepted, they were suspicious. Thought it was some scheme on the Fodlan side of things. But you seemed … okay.” He turned away, shaking his head. “I thought you were, and even though they’re my parents, they trusted me on that judgment. I guess it could end up being a marriage for money, considering all that stuff they sent with you. Best case scenario, you stay and end up another satellite wife to a guy who constantly travels, and we become pen pals. That’s not the worst outcome, but I doubt it would happen.”

“Of course not. I doubt you’d accept being pen pals with how much you talk.”

“Right?” Her joke brought a color of mirth to his face as he turned to face her again. “But seriously. And I am being serious.” He moved close and held both of her shoulders in his hands. “I’m putting on my most serious face because I do need you to trust me here. …Do you trust me?”

She studied his face. No trace of a smile, no laugh lines, and no easy dimple on his face. His eyes were wide and dark with so little light to the room. Edelgard asked, “Do you trust me.”

She watched his throat bob. He said, “Not as much as I want to.”

“You are smart as ever.” 

“I get if you feel the same for me. I get that you’re scared of assassination or whatever your family might do to punish you if you mess this up for them.” Claude closed the distance between them, yet did not lay a hand on her. It made her chest tight regardless. “But here. In this moment. Will you trust me, for this alone?”

“…yes,” she said.

“Alright. If you get married to him, I think he won’t protect you from whatever it is you’re afraid of,” Claude said.

“That is not unlike what I expected,” she answered.

“Great. If you’ve come to the same conclusion, why don’t we work together,” he said. “If you open up to my parents about your fears, they won’t ignore you. They wouldn’t mind any reason to cut this short. Anyone would accept canceling the announcement now.”

“No,” she said.

“…what.”

“I cannot go back,” she said.

“I’m not saying you have to go back to the Empire, Edelgard.”

“It is not so simple as you seem to think,” she said. “If you will excuse me.”

Claude stared at her and she could almost see the flurry of responses flashing through his mind like lightning before he nodded. When he left her room, he did so without a word. Watching him leave in this way was just another tiny death she had to commit to. This was no different than the dozen others she had accepted into her heart, with every death and miserable decision, until nothing remained but coal and ice. Necessities were the only thing Edelgard could allow into her life. That was what she told herself. Between the two of them, a week passed, a little colder than before. Now, when she practiced archery, Claude was there, too. He was better with the bow than her and it seemed to humor him to split her arrows in two on the fields. In that way, they spent wordless time and each arrow seemed to be the attempt to bridge some kind of message. What it may have been, however, Edelgard did not care to unravel.

Ejder had asked, "Have you made friends here?"

Maybe it had been a good thing she had told him no.

She kept the poisons under her pillow, now. It was a dangerous choice to make, but holding them ever closer was a note to dismiss the anticipation welling in her chest. There would be little better opportunity to commit than now. She could poison her fiancé the night before he left. It was only meant to be a temporary visit, after all, and she would not be allowed to leave until her tutoring was complete. That would allow him to be found dead the next day traveling home. There could be a million reasons why he was killed in a place where assassination was so common. Blame could be traced to her, certainly, but she had the word of the palace royals. Never was there a young woman so willing to indebt herself for the sake of family. The performance she had given Claude should have been the wax seal.

As she began to fall to sleep, a creak whispered its way across the room. Edelgard did not panic. She stayed still, as she was, steadily moving her chest in an approximation of breathing. This was not the first time someone had entered her room at night. Workers had come before to shift through her worn clothes and take them away, or bring her fresh linens and towels. The space of the moon made her discard that thought. It was too late and too early for any of them to be out about the palace. Though the door certainly opened, she could hear no footsteps. This was someone who knew how to move in darkness. She opened an eye and tried to peer around her bedsheet without moving. There was a figure in the darkness. Someone stood to a corner of the room, avoiding the moonlight shining through her window. Try as she might to see them, the figure was outfitted in perfect black and proved impossible to make out better detail. She did note that they were of an average height, not massive like Nader or skinny like one of the many castle servants. The way this person moved was practiced, precise – the closest she had seen was Hubert’s skulking in the dark. Panic blossomed in her throat and she swallowed it down. They could be no one but an assassin. This stranger stood with such practice that even their form began to disappear into the darkness, as though her eyes were playing a trick on her, and there was no one at all.

Edelgard ran through her options. Poison would do little good in a one-on-one confrontation. Even if she did attempt to use it, it meant moving her hand out from the sheet and under the pillow. That would be too clear a giveaway. Behind her, though – on the opposite side of her bed, she kept her boots. Nerve-wracking as it was, Edelgard shifted her shoulders and lazily rolled over in her bed. It was no uncommon thing for her to have a restless sleep. Even if this person had been observing her for nights before this, she desperately hoped they had no idea of the belongings she kept. Even Claude had no idea of the dagger. A stranger wouldn’t be able to guess. She allowed her arm to slip off the bed and it hung over the side for several tense minutes. No knife came to meet her back. The dagger fit smoothly into her calloused hand like a hint of careful relief.

Despite achieving a weapon, her mind went blank. To move now would mean bringing the wrath of this stranger. If she raised her arm to hide the knife under her pillow, which would be suspicious enough that they’d likely make their move and leave. The fact that they had not yet attacked her likely meant something as well, but sleep dulled the typical sharp edge of her mind. Perhaps they were simply hired to watch her sleeping patterns and report back to someone else. Or perhaps they were waiting for the right moment to kill her. Waiting for her moment of restlessness to pass so there would be no way for her to fight back. A proper killer needed to be patient. 

Someone with the ambition to survive needed the same.

Years could have passed in the time Edelgard waited there clutching the dagger. She allowed her breathing to fall to nothing, until not even she could properly hear it. Her heart beat too loud in her ears by response and she cursed it, desperate for the fear of what she needed to be able to hear. In the eternity she waited, Edelgard realized she had perhaps made the wrong choice. Now that she had turned, she had no way to watch the intruder. Perhaps she would have had a better way of surviving if she’d stayed facing them, to fight them by hand. Or perhaps they would simply stab a knife through her hands and suffocate her before she could act. The thought of her own death terrified her and, in that darkness, she thought of her siblings.

The air was still.

And then she felt a disturbance, so slight it could have been a fly. Edelgard twisted around on her bed, throwing herself toward the movement. They were midstep and it made it easy to overbalance them. She fell heavy on a warm body that barely choked back their own gasp of surprise. When closer, it was easier to make out the fuzzy shape of them in the darkness and she held the dagger to their throat.

“I will not be taken so easily,” she hissed. Her hair fell out of the scarf and caught the moonlight between them. “You are a fool if you think I was not prepared to kill you from the start.”

“Wait,” the stranger said, and their voice made her mind waver. She grabbed the mask on their face and tore it off.

“Claude,” she whispered. “You … you, of all people, I ...” She pressed the blade of the dagger closer to his throat, till blood began to prick the edge of metal and block the moonlight reflecting off it. “I trusted you.”

“Then don’t stop now,” he hissed. “We need to hide, you’re-“

The door opened, this time louder than when Claude had snuck into the room. In the moment she took to look, Claude grabbed her wrist and rolled the short distance it took to get them under the bed. He held a finger over his mouth. Though she hated to listen, now, Edelgard gave him a curt nod. Craning her head up, she watched someone else walk into her room. Despite the way they opened the door, they seemed somewhat good at walking quietly as well. If Edelgard was not such a light sleeper, either one of them might have taken her off guard. 

The two of them listened in silence as the new intruder walked through the room. They opened her closets and the door to her bathroom, cursing in Almyran as they did so. Looking for her. They finally came to a pause at her empty bed.

Claude pulled her close enough that she could hear the panicked beat of his heart, the beat that matched her own, and whispered quieter than wind, “Trust me.”

She could think of no way she could speak quietly enough to avoid being heard. Edelgard mirrored the way he had wrapped his arms around her back, and as if it struck her in the moment, pushed her forehead against his and gave a resolute nod. The two of them would do anything to survive. 

Above, she heard the sound of metal sliding against leather, like a cold blade in her heart. Claude took the cue and the two rolled from underneath the bed in the same moment a sword stabbed through the center and smashed into the floor. She felt Claude’s hands fumble away from her back and saw him put a long straight pipe in his mouth. The exhale was felt rather than heard, and it took her eyes too long to track where he had been pointing in the darkness.

The intruder had let go of their blade by the time she made out their form. They fumbled back into moonlight, and then further, tripping backwards over themself. Edelgard and Claude yelled at the same time, however, getting up too late as the intruder fell backwards over the fencing of her small veranda and off the side of the palace. Edelgard’s legs felt weak and useless, but Claude dragged her up despite the obvious shaking overwhelming his body. They walked to the window and looked out over the side. At the bottom, a body laid splayed out in the darkness.

“We need to go now,” he said, and took off running toward the hall. 

Edelgard did not immediately follow. She pulled the poisons from under her pillow and hid them in the sheath she typically left her dagger in. It took bare moments, but it still took longer than she wanted to catch up to Claude again.

Once she matched his stride, he hissed over his ragged breathing, “We have to check that body.”

“To make sure he’s dead,” she finished, and he nodded grimly.

The two ran noisily through the halls and down the stairs, loud enough for candlelight to begin to flicker on and people to reach their heads out of doors through the halls. It took bare minutes for them to reach the bottom and run out of the castle. Desperation carried them across the palace grounds, past even sleepy guards who began to wake at their tumultuous run. It occurred to Edelgard that normally she would never do something like this, a terrible infliction that had grown on her in these last months. If it were her alone, she’d let the body be found.

With Claude at her side, though, the two stand below her room’s veranda to the sight of blood and nothing else.

“Damn it,” he muttered. Glancing around, he said, “Someone moved the body.”

“You are certain they couldn’t have moved themself?”

“No one could survive a fall like that,” Claude muttered. He glanced at her and took off the dark jacket he wore to throw it over her bare head without comment. “Unless you plan to tell me a way someone could.”

“If they used magic,” she said. Edelgard took the opportunity to shove her hair out of sight, foolish as she looked. “They could have teleported themself. Or they may have softened the blow with something enchanted. There are many ways.”

“Yeah, but you’re forgetting one thing, princess.” Claude crouched on the ground and pulled out an empty vial. With it, he scooped up a sample of the soil that had begun to absorb blood. “Magic isn’t an Almyran technique.”

“If they were working with magicians, it wouldn’t have to be,” she said.

“…what are you saying,” Claude asked.

“I’m saying this assassin could have been working with someone,” she said, cursing her own foolishness for bringing it up.

“Someone from Fodlan,” he said. “…someone from your family?”

“Not my family,” Edelgard said. “But close enough.”

“It might not surprise you to hear this, but that requires further explanation,” he said.

“I doubt I could,” she said. She turned to walk away and he grabbed her wrist.

“Nope,” he said. “You don’t get to play little miss secrets when we both almost got killed. Particularly when I almost got killed trying to keep an eye on you.”

“You were keeping an eye on me? Claude, I do not believed I asked for any such thing. Nor did I say you could enter my room. More than that, I thought you were upset with me after we last spoke. How long have you been doing this?”

At that, he was sheepish. “This was the only night.” Edelgard stared expectantly, pushing him with a more beleaguered look by the moment. Claude ruffled his hair, as though it was a simple matter of a prank. “Alright, I’ll admit I kept an eye outside yesterday, but I figured tonight, someone could easily break into your room through the window, and.” He stopped again, and this time, she didn’t want him to continue. But he locked eye contact with her. “I knew you were scared. No matter how frustrated I was, I knew you needed someone to watch out for you now.”

In a normal circumstance, Edelgard would reject it. She was no weakling, and she almost said just that to him. But there was a terrible sadness that came in his words, and she could extrapolate the truth. “Because no one watched out for you.”

“…it wasn’t that simple,” he said. “But that’s the thing. Nothing is. Especially not assassination attempts. If someone wants to kill you, they’ll find a way. To be honest, usually, if there’s more than one person, an assassin will back off. Strength in numbers and all that. I was hoping that would be enough to ward off anyone that wanted to try, honestly.” He glanced to the side. “That intruder had to know we were both under that bed. But they still tried to kill us.”

“Who can deny the opportunity to kill two birds with one stone?” she asked.

“That makes sense to you, I’m sure, but most Almyrans wouldn’t break into the palace just to try and kill a couple members of royalty with a sword in hand. More flashy than people around here go for.”

Edelgard’s mouth was dry as her mind turned to her fiancé. She did not speak as she turned and began to jog up the stairs to the castle, to a crowd that was unfortunately growing in size. Claude caught up and waved people aside, quick and relaxed comments in Almyran about taking an early morning jog. Without a body, he wasn’t wrong. They had little they could do or say.

“What is this commotion.” Edelgard’s ears perked at the familiar voice. “Who would be awake at such an hour?”

Before them, Ejder stood with a candle in his head and rather extravagant pajamas. All thought left Edelgard’s head as she stared at a man she assumed had to be dead. Claude gave a polite bow.

“Apologies, my guest. The princess and I have a peculiar training regimen. I unfortunately had a bad trip down the stairs and caused some concern. I hope you would be willing to return to bed,” he said, formal and perfect in his Almyran.

Ejder and the crowd around them seemed to consider Claude’s comment before slowly clearing out. Though Claude was still smiling, his hand brushed against Edelgard’s, shaking uncontrollably. The two of them made their way to her room, door still splayed open. Inside, there was no longer any sign of struggle. The sword that had been stabbed through the bed was gone and even the bed showed no damage or tears. All that remained was Claude’s mask and the dagger she had left on the ground in their mad dash.

“Wow,” he said. Claude’s knees gave out from under him like the sight had drained the last of his strength and only Edelgard’s strong upper body kept him from crashing into the floor. “Ah.” As she dragged up upright, the two fumbled close to her bed. She helped him sit and he took the opportunity to fall onto the mattress like a brick. “Thanks for saving my perfect nose. I’d hate to see it get ruined over something so boring.”

Edelgard sat on the floor and leaned against her bed. “This isn’t the time for jokes,” she muttered.

“Or maybe it’s the perfect time,” he said.

“There’s more than one person involved,” she said.

She heard him click his teeth together. “Yeah.”

Dragging herself back up, Edelgard dragged both the chairs from her balcony into the room. She used one to barricade the entrance before closing the opening to her balcony. “You should sleep,” she said. “We can discuss this better once you’re more rested.”

“I’m plenty awake,” Claude said. “You can regale me with stories of whatever Fodlan magic is apparently trying to kill me right now, if you’d like.”

She circled the room, looking for openings or tricks that could have been laid in the moments they had left. “If you sleep, I promise I will tell you something.” Edelgard glanced back to him. “When was the last time you slept?”

“Sleep is for the weak and cowardly,” he said with a quiet yawn. 

“You said you’d kept watch yesterday night,” she said. “And you cannot call yourself cowardly if you know both your mother and myself. So if you would tell me the last time you slept, I would appreciate it.” Nothing came of her words, but when Edelgard looked back to Claude, his chest moved rhythmic and quiet. “You’re such a fool,” she muttered. For him to fall asleep in the same room as her belied greater weakness than any Fodlan based cowardice. She took a chair from their traditional dining table and sat across the room. It wasn’t as though she could sleep after an attempt. If she were staying awake to protect herself, it was only logical that she could use the time to keep an eye on Claude’s safety as well. The sunk cost fallacy was not lost on her.

The next morning startled Edelgard out of a fugue state with a knock at her door. She watched it, waiting for the knob to rattle, but the person on the other side made no move to force their way in. The door stayed still with the chair still in front of it. When she could bring herself to look away, she found Claude watching her, laying on his side with an arm propping up his head.

“Morning, princess,” he said, cheerful. “You’re going to tell me about that thing you mentioned last night.”

“I’m not sure I know exactly what you’re referring to,” she started, but a loud tut made her stop.

“No, no, no.” Claude sat upright and cross-legged, leaning forward with his hands against his face, propping himself up on the bed. “I said you are going to. The explanation is going to be next words that come out of your pretty mouth. Because you promised me and a promise is a promise, especially one made to the exceptional young man who just saved your life.”

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you planned for this,” Edelgard said.

“Ah, but you are quite sharp. Now please, go ahead, pay my rambling no mind.”

She leaned back in her chair, pushing it to where it better faced Claude. The way he sat was not strategic or scheming. He’d have a harder time unraveling the tangle he’d locked himself in than she would have driving a sword into his heart and escaping. Edelgard bit the inside of her cheek. It was a gamble on his part, but it was a clever one. He asked, without having to say it, if she was willing to kill someone placing themselves defenseless before her.

She could not say she would not. But here, knowing the look in Claude’s eyes, she crossed her legs and clasped her hands over a knee. Edelgard said, “In my country, magic originates broadly from crests and the study of such. Crests are signs of nobility and nobility is a sign of having had a crest. One does not require a crest to use magic, but much of its usage would not have been possible without the groundwork of crests.” She paused, more for dramatic effect, to gauge his reaction, but he gave no obvious response. “I am not fully aware of how magic exists in other countries, but if the rarity is as you say, I suspect that the magical interference we saw last night had to be sourced from Fodlan.”

“Anywhere in particular?” he asked, lazy and sarcastic.

She ran her tongue along the edge of her uneven teeth. During an experiment, she’d knocked one out of her head from the pain, and they had made sure to replace it upon her survival. Princesses needed to be pristine on the outside. Edelgard sat on her memories until Claude cleared his throat.

“I didn’t want to ask sooner because I knew it would be hard on you,” he said, more formal now. “But that’s why your body is damaged the way it is. And your hair. The sort of supernatural strength that lets a person of your height throw around a great ax like its nothing. The fact that you were so insistent about so many weird hypotheticals when we were discussing our countries. They’re all connected.”

Every word was the wrong one to say, but it would be so much easier if Claude could just pluck the truth out of her like wishbones to be broken. It was easier when all she had to say was – “Yes.”

“Cool,” he said. “But that doesn’t help us here and now, Edelgard.”

Like he was baiting her. She forced herself to swallow, though her mouth was dry. “The people who did this to me are likely the people in league with last night’s assassin.”

“Oooh.” His eyes lit up and he moved closer. “Now we’re getting somewhere interesting.”

“They took control of my father’s reign,” she said. The words came out like awkward realities and untruths, and she wanted to trade over to say it in Almyran. At least then, she would not feel she was betraying her history. But she did not know the language well enough. There were hardly enough words in Fodlan speak to express her trauma. “They wanted to a subject that had two crests, one more powerful than any other. Killed my siblings. Almost killed me. …I thought it had been for the sake of making me their Emperor, but now I suppose not.” She laughed, sudden and harsh. “I was about to say it had been only two years, but I suppose another has passed here with you.” Her hands were not her own and they picked at stray strings of her clothes until it was not string, and Claude’s hands moved over hers. Looking down, she saw the edges of red under her nails from the way she had picked at her skin. “They’ve been planning for a thousand years and even my uncle is involved, now. After he’d spent so many years trying to help me, he chose them.” Saying it like that made her feel like a child again. Piteous and miserable, throwing a tantrum about what she couldn’t have. Yet, tears did not come to her. Ice gripped her chest and threatened to steal her memory and her tongue, but she forced herself forward. “From the start. I believe they sent me here to have me killed due to my plans to undermine them. Perhaps they thought I would be killed by an Almyran noble or commoner for being from Fodlan. But I suppose when that fell through, they fell back on their usual schemes. And that is what you have before you now.”

“And what’s that?” he asked in a whisper.

“Me,” she said. Shaking her head, she went on. “A leader who cannot die till my ambitions are attained. Or a child who was meant to perish years ago. I am no longer sure.”

Claude’s hands remained over hers, cupping her bloodied fingernails away from the light. “You’ve wanted to return all along.”

“When I realized you were the prince, I thought my worries were over,” she said. “And now I find they have only been compounded.”

He chuckled and said, “So you were prepared to kill even me.” She could not respond. “You were always playing with that poison.” The question of how he knew was distant and everything became nothing more than – of course he knew. This was his domain.

Honesty was poison on her tongue. “I was prepared for any inevitability, did the need arise.”

He stared at her hands, circling a thumb into her palm. “So were you. Or are you planning to kill your fiancé.”

“That is not something I would answer,” she said. “But I would not make myself culpable in such a crime. I have no desire to be locked in an Almyran dungeon.” To the Almyran prince, son of its highest ranking officers, she could say nothing more. Sitting before Claude now was as to sit before her judge and executioner.

At that, he looked at her, terrible eye contact that made anxiety burn up her spine. “If the people who hurt you and your siblings are the same that are attacking the two of us now, it’s not a matter of being locked up, Edelgard. I’m not going to throw you under the bus, but if you’re still thinking about killing your fiancé for the sake of returning to a snake den…” He trailed off, but she understood the intent of his words with a sick and angry bitterness. Her hands pulled away as if his touch burned.

How could he – and how dare he – after she deigned to tell him anything, everything, too little, far too much. Edelgard swallowed the rage that threatened to take her and play her like a puppet. “As I said before. I have no desire to be culpable in any death. Nor would I go so far to say that the back-handed officials in Fodlan have something to do with our predicament in absolutes. Unfortunately, as we have no body, we have no way to be sure.” 

“We do,” he said.

“And pray tell how,” she said, mighty and suspicious.

“I got a blood sample,” he said. “If he died immediately upon hitting the ground, then the poison I used wouldn’t have had the chance to circulate through the body. It’d be less likely to show up in a small sample. But if it does show up, it did circulate. Which would mean they didn’t die on impact. Which would mean magic, which would mean the people you described rather than someone downstairs dragging a body away before we got there.” Claude tilted his head and raised an eyebrow and she could not summon a response beyond vague frustration. “If I can examine this, we might have an answer.”

That wasn’t the answer she wanted.

In Edelgard’s mind, it was a fact the Agarthans were involved, as they were in every part of her life. But she wanted Claude out of it. Out of her business, out of her reality, out of the future she was trying to tear into with bare, bloodied hands. Yet here he was, digging deeper into her truth, like he had any right. A sane man would leave. The question she wanted answered, more than any other, was –

_If you believe I was ready to kill you, how could you continue to act as though nothing has changed between us?_

She would not dare to admit that aloud. That was tantamount to treason against the court in her mind, regardless of how true it was. Tantamount to pointing at the writing on the wall between them, written in blood she had trudged through since her life had been picked apart and rearranged into who she had to be today.

“If you’re so interested in that mystery, you can solve it on your own,” she said and pointed to the door. “But for now, let me rest.”

Edelgard did not watch as Claude left, but she could count the seconds from the moment it took him to open the door and close the door as if they were years. It was the second time in bare days, but it felt no better than the last. Only once she heard his steps track away down the hall did she allow herself to collapse into bed. Sleep took her and though it was restless, she did not remember her own nightmares.

For the next two days, she did not leave her room. Weariness took her like sickness and left her aching bone deep. No sleep could relieve her, nor food satisfy. The thought of her plans were ash in her mouth and the flavor made even water bitter. If her fiancé called for her, she did not hear it. No one intruded and it seemed Claude knew too well what troubled her. A part of her thought this was the prelude to arrest, now that he had a semblance of confession, enough to point a finger. Despite the thought, Edelgard could not force herself to stand and try the door to leave. In many ways, it seemed difficult to convince herself it mattered any longer.

To speak her suffering aloud in such a way, she wondered if it had ever mattered in the first place. How much of her choices had been those of a child mad with power and rage, and how much were her – she could not say there was a line between the two, now. Count Ordelia’s mistrust only made more sense now, as though he had read the lines of her bones to see how foolish and sick she was. To be unmade by words was not meant to be the fate of an emperor. Yet – here she was. Edelgard von Hresvelg, last daughter of the Empire, and she thought, perhaps that were for the best.

It was only at Claude’s impertinent burst through her door on the third day of her trauma fugue that she regained a sense of proper frustration.

“Did you blow off your hands or merely forget how to knock?” she said, tired, but somewhat herself.

“They died before they hit the ground,” he said without ceremony. “I solved that mystery. Now you get to pay your part of the bargain.” When she did not respond, Claude thrust his papers at her. “I took the blood samples and separated it from the soil. I tested small quantities on plants in my lab. I had controls and I had variables, and Edelgard, here is the thing, the ones I tested died within a day. I did that with a sample that would have been too small to hurt a human, and it still worked. So please.” He said down on her bed. “Elucidate to me how there is magic involved and how the people who tortured you may have been able to do this.”

She was slow to start. It was hard to remember what she had already told Claude versus the realities that haunted her mind. “They’re unknowable,” she said. “They have people everywhere. I didn’t expect that they’d be here, but I suppose it makes sense.”

“Nothing is unknowable,” he interrupted. “I get that these guys are powerful, but there has to be something more to this. Maybe they were trying to frame your fiancé and get your country to wage a war over here for killing you.”

“No,” she said. “No. They are focused foremost on Seiros. They would not be interested in making Adrestia go to war with another country before that.”

“Great. That’s information. See, they aren’t unknowable, because you know about them!” Claude ran a hand through his hair. “The thing is, I don’t think it’s just about spite or getting rid of you. They could have gotten rid of you in a million more straight-forward ways. They killed your siblings without drawing any real attention. It wouldn’t have been hard to dispose of you in Adrestia if they really wanted to.”

Edelgard tried to speak, but he was right. They shouldn’t have needed to send her away. They already had proven how easy it was to kill without question.

“If they have so much control over your government, why did they need to do all that experimentation on you in the first place?” He was more speaking to himself than her now, and she kept her mouth shut. “Couldn’t they have just had the emperor declare a war first, if they’re so focused on revenge on that Seiros person?”

“It is not so simple,” she said, but as she spoke, she realized her words came out hoarse. 

It brought too much attention. Edelgard didn’t regard herself as someone versed in emotion, but it was something of concern on Claude’s face as she brought herself to look at him. He said, “Your father was the emperor.”

“Of course,” she said. “It is only in the last three years he has become a figurehead.”

“But weren’t the interlopers in the country before that?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Did he not know?” Claude’s question was simple, but it made Edelgard’s mind go blank. “They were working their way into the country for years, right?”

Ordelia’s words came to her mind. “Yes,” she said, shaky. “They were.”

“So why didn’t he fight it off?” Claude kept staring at her. “…why didn’t he fight them on the experiments?”

“He did,” she spat. Took two steps back, in her mind. She repeated, calmer, “He did. But he could not stop it.” Everyone but Lysithea von Ordelia died. Edelgard would have vomited if her stomach hadn’t have been so empty. “He tried.”

“It’s about more than trying when you’re leading a country though,” he murmured. “It’s about stopping corruption when it buds. If it got to a point where he had no ability to stop it, that meant they let it grow.”

“Interesting theory,” Edelgard said. “Unfortunately, you are a child, and you do not know what Adrestia is like.”

Claude was silent in his incalculable thought, but finally he spoke. “Your father let it happen.”

“He didn’t,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m not going to lie to you. I respect you too much for it. He did.”

Edelgard dug her fingers into her face, putting Claude out of her sight. “Then what are you trying to say. That has nothing to do with our current predicament.”

“They work by destabilizing countries,” he answered her. “That’s what it sounds like. They get to the leaders and they make them turn a blind eye until they have enough power that even if the leaders wanted to stop them, they couldn't.”

“Then my fiancé is involved after all,” she said, embittered and tired.

“Not necessarily.” There was care in his voice and it made her sicker to think that he felt bad for telling her something so stupid and obvious that she had convinced herself to ignore for years. “If they had officials convince him with a dowry, that’s nothing unusual. But going from there, they could have a jumping point to bribe their way into Almyran politics and start trying the same thing over time.” He trailed off.

“I’m glad for your realization,” she said. “I suppose you did not need me to aid you in solving this mystery after all.”

“When I apologized, I meant it,” Claude said. “I’ve already told you. I don’t mind if you hate me. Really, I get it. But. Edelgard, I don’t want to lie to you. I’m an outsider to your problems, but you know what I think about all that already.”

A part of her wanted to tell him he would never understand her suffering. That he could never understand Adrestia and Fodlan and all the struggle that led to its corruption, but that side of her was not so loud. She said, “Maybe you’re right.” Edelgard said to him, “It is not terrible to have a view from the outside.”

His hand hovered close to hers and she took his, both of them squeezing at the same time. Claude said, “I’ll talk to my parents tomorrow. They’ll probably council with your fiancé and we’ll just have to go from there. I know it won’t get rid of the danger, but knowledge does a lot more than you know, princess. I promise, it’ll help. For the moment though, I did interrupt your beauty sleep, so I’ll let you get some rest.”

“I suppose you think that’s kind,” she said.

“I figure you deserve some kindness,” he answered.

When he left, this time, it was not so slow or concerned as before. When she closed her eyes, she fell asleep quickly, yet not without nightmares. They tracked through her mind, the voice of her father distant, as she tried to find the right door to escape through. Edelgard woke to a door opening and though she struggled between consciousness and her nightmares for an instant, she shot up and threw the dagger under her pillow. In darkness, she heard a quiet curse in Almyran.

“Any closer and you’d have left a scar on my handsome face,” she heard across the room. “That’d almost be a worse crime.”

“Claude?” she asked, hesitant.

“Wonderful guess, princess,” he said, and now her eyes could make him out, tearing open her closet and throwing clothes inside of a bag.

“What are you doing,” she asked despite herself. The memory overlaid itself with one of her uncle, before he became the man he was today, tearing into her room and stealing her away in the night to take her to her mother.

“Your fiancé was found dead,” he said.

A strange cold filled her chest. This was what she had wanted and it gave her no relief. Edelgard jumped out of bed and walked to him. “Does anyone know you’re doing this?”

“No,” he said. Claude caught himself and shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“You suspect me,” she murmured.

“I’d love to banter, but we don’t have time,” he said, shoving the bag into her arms. “If there’s anything else, pack it, and I will meet you at your balcony.” Claude turned to leave, but quickly spun back around, hands flat in front of him. “Don’t. Do not. Do. Not. Leave this room. Cool? Cool. Okay. I will be right back.”

Claude knew her well enough that he had only included her favorite clothes – what few dresses comfortable enough that she bothered to wear them, the clothes he’d given her that she’d sussed out were merely things he’d outgrown, and a few Almyran texts she’d kept. She dug out the poisons and wrapped them in a shirt before packing them, along with the books she had received from Bernadetta and Count Ordelia. The knife she retrieved from where it stuck into the wall and returned it to the sheath in her boot. She peered over the balcony to her room and realized he’d left her with no rope. If he planned to strand her, this would be the perfect way.

Sickening as it was, foolish as she felt, Edelgard put her bag down and swung her legs up over the balcony to wait. If she was so late that a man had been murdered and she had not been the one to do it, trusting Claude for a moment longer would not be likely to shorten her life any more than she had already done. Below her, there were few people out. It was possible Ejder wasn’t dead and Claude was using this as an opportunity to run. She wondered if he was the one in league with the Agarthans the whole time and he was merely playing the long game. The thought made her smile. If it were Claude she was up against, it was at least familiar.

“Oh, what’s made you smile?” came from above her. “Thinking about a boy you like, now?”

Edelgard looked up to find not only Claude grinning down at her, but also something of a lizard – pure white and tilting its head at her curiously. In her shock, she could feel herself slip on the banister, but Claude had already landed beside her, grabbing her arm to balance her. 

“You didn’t think I’d abandon you, did you?” he asked with a smarmy grin.

“You do realize I loathe you,” she said. It was stupid to be so playful when she had just been told terrible news, but it was easier than acknowledging the problem.

“What a treasure,” he said, holding his other hand to his chest. “You know they say there’s a very fine line between loathing and loving a person.”

“So you have time to banter with me now?” she asked, smiling despite herself.

“We are about to leave,” he said.

The lizard came down and as it flapped long leathery wings, Edelgard realized this was a true wyvern. Claude gestured for her to jump on. 

“Are you sure we aren’t overburdening this creature?” she asked.

“Princess, you are light as a feather. Also, wyverns are strong enough to carry men who weigh upward of 150 kilograms, so I am sure my friend here should have little issue with the two of us and our carryon bags. Now,” he said, holding out a hand. “Are you willing to come with me?”

Something kept her glued to the balcony. “How do you know Ejder is dead?”

The playful smile left his face. This was the honest Claude – the one she perhaps disliked more, for how much she could trust him. “The queen,” he started, and restarted. “My mom. They’re hiding it for now. I eavesdropped on the right discussion.” He tried to laugh and failed. “It was poison that killed him.” There is a look of steel in his eyes. “The same one that I used on that assassin a week ago.”

“They can’t necessarily trace it back to you. We don’t even have the body of the assassin,” Edelgard said.

“Unfortunately, I made that poison myself. It’s a special cocktail and one I’ve used before. It can be traced back to me and only me.” He ran his hands through his hair like he did every time Claude was overwhelmed by how much he didn’t know and couldn’t control. “It can kill a grown man in minutes. It is impossible for him to have died a week later.”

“Then it had to be the people after me,” she said, too cognizant of the time she was burning. “If they were able to sample the poison from the assassin’s body, they could have used that.”

“And how do we prove it was the shadowy people in the dark who tried assassinate us in an attempt we told no one about?” Though Claude had raised his eyebrow in a playful smile, the stress on his face was obvious. "I didn't think it would come back to bite me so hard, I will admit. But people aren't about to believe me so easily when someone else is dead and I am not."

“Fine, you are not wrong, but they have no reason to assume it had to be you. If need be, you could even say I stole your poison to kill him.”

“The crown prince has been terribly close with the Fodlan princess these last months,” Claude said in Almyran, a mocking imitation of nobility. “How are we to say he wouldn’t dare?” He slipped back to Fodlan speak. “My parents and I both know how they see me. The coward son.” 

“Then the blame should land on me,” she said. “I am the one who has the most to gain from his death. I am the only one who should have to run.” More the reason she hated him was the honesty he could draw out without needing to ask.

“Oh, I know.” His voice struck through her like an arrow. Before she could ask another question, how much he knew, Claude gave a faint smile. “Fortunately, I already planned to run away. I had planned to do it sooner, but you know. Life is weird sometimes.”

“You can’t say you stayed because of me,” Edelgard muttered. Just to say those words was like allowing some of the sick poison in her chest free of its coal-packed prison, a heart made of nothing but fuel to a limited fire. “If you sincerely suspect I had something to do with his death, there is no reason to bring me.”

“It is never that simple,” Claude answered. “It’s your choice, ultimately, Edelgard. But I thought you’d prefer that over being trapped to circumstance. Jump into the fire with me or stay in the skillet to burn. I know it’s not much of a choice, but I figure it’s more of one than you had before.”

If there were hands banging on the door to her room, it would have been easier to pick. Then she could jump without a thought to safety as though she was in a fabulous opera. As though none of this had been the life she had to life, and she was a child again, watching a play with her kind uncle in Enbarr. No one knocked on her door. There was no whisper of acknowledgement to the wyvern above palace grounds. There was only her and Claude, sitting on the banister at her side.

In another life.

Edelgard could see herself shaking her head and laying back to bed, using clever manipulations to blame Claude for everything, because truly, it was not her. She had nothing to do with the crime. She would return home, triumphant, and her Uncle would stare in such shock that she returned without falling or breaking. The way her father would smile upon her, just to have the opportunity to see his daughter shining in the face of darkness that had always trapped her.

Yet Count Ordelia’s words rang in her ears. _I feel it would be criminal if I were not honest to you, here and now_. Her father’s crimes in allowing the ravage of their house and their family. How her father’s crimes only led to the incineration of their own.

She did not turn away, hesitating from the fantasy of returning home.

 _I think you’re strong enough to run_.

Bernadetta’s book remained in her bag.

Edelgard would destroy the church and the crest system and everything that ever hurt anyone she ever loved. That was what she had survived to do, the lone thing that kept her alive through torture and despair. Something burned so deep into her heart it could no longer be called hope. 

Claude said, “Please.”

Blood could have poured from her leaking veins and out her mouth at that single word. Like fire burning through her veins, all she could think about was the colonization of her father’s legacy, the trauma he had allowed and left behind in the final years of his true rule, and the uncle who had tried to save her from not the Agarthans, but from the Adrestian Empire and its grotesque legacy twisted by both Seiros and Agarthans. She thought of nervous eyes, terrified of admitting bloodlines for the prejudice and hatred that it brought, and how even in a place without crests –

Even in a place without crests, there was still suffering.

Brigid. Dagda. Almyra. Fodlan.

In Edelgard’s blood, beyond that of Seiros and Nemesis, had always been a history of destruction. Adrestia’s war with Brigid and Dagda had nothing to do with crests. Almyra and the Alliance’s battles had nothing to do with crests. Her war and her ambition and her reason to live.

She answered him with a question. “Why are you helping me?”

“The people who ruined your life. You think they were trying to kill you by sending you here. But it’s not that, Edelgard.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” she said.

He stared like he was trying to read her mind, but she had no idea why. “You’re so smart, but you don’t get it, do you.”

“What.”

“What they did was never about you,” he said, and it sounded strangely sad. Like he felt bad for her. “They weren’t sending you here to throw you away. I feel like a fool for not realizing it sooner.”

“What changed,” she said.

“They wanted you to kill him,” he answered. “When you didn’t, they tried to goad you with an assassin. When that didn’t work, they took what we gave them, and used that.” The words fell into place and her legs shook beneath her. “You said it yourself, Edelgard. They made you to be a tool.”

Everything they had ever done was for power. It was all for the sake of destroying Seiros. It was all for the sake of establishing their control. The Insurrection and every vapid war against defectors over the years was their way of destabilizing Adrestia so they could take over. Edelgard covered her face in her hands. “No,” she whispered. “No.”

“You would know better than anyone,” Claude said. “You’re the one who survived.”

If anything could have made her cry, that should have been it. Instead, Edelgard fell to her knees, overwhelmed by the crushing weight of her reality. She had never been anything but a tool. They had known from the beginning, and her uncle perhaps most of all. 

She said, “Then turn me over.”

“Nah,” he said.

“You have no reason to help me,” she said. “I asked and you’ve just given me more reason that I should be hidden away. If I can be so easily used, why not lock me away from the world so they can no longer use my bones as they see fit?”

“Because they never expected you’d gain an ally out here,” Claude answered. “Because they don’t know me like they think they know you, and I would never turn my back on someone who wants to change.”

“Wanting to change means nothing.” Edelgard dragged herself back up to her feet, unfortunately buoyed by his words. “A person wanting to change cannot stand so easily against a history of evil.”

“Yeah, but you’re cool and stuff,” he said, as though to brush away her misery and tragedy. “Come on. Let’s be cool. Let’s change the world. Who cares that your dad sucked. Who cares that they wanted you to be a murder weapon. I don’t! So come on, princess.” He climbed onto his wyvern and held out a hand. “Trust me.”

Edelgard felt she was letting her heart break open with an edge of hope she dared not to have as she took his hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Vibrates intensely.  
> I could so easily go on because I have unfortunately made an entire AU in my head for this divergence scenario where they still go go Garreg Mach but I have college to worry about and therefore have no time to write a million words about it! Maybe later! I'm still gay! I love them! Bye!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! BYE!!!!!!!!!!!!


End file.
